Primeval Series 6, Episode 5 - The Fall of Angels
by qjay
Summary: A giant shark and the return of Danny Quinn interrupt Connor and Abby's American honeymoon in this, the fifth story in my theoretical sixth series for the show. Back at the ARC, Becker and Jess finally make a decision about their new relationship...
1. Teaser

**Primeval 6.5 **("The Fall of Angels")

by qjay

___DISCLAIMER: Primeval was created by Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines. It does not belong to me. This is not-for-profit fan fiction, and no infringement is intended._

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story was originally written in script format; I'm converting it to prose as I continue writing my own version of a sixth series for the UK Primeval. I haven't seen the New World spin-off yet, so these stories may contradict it. I did toss in a New World shout-out in this episode, to try to fit them together a little._

_Also, I'm not British. Please excuse any slang or terminology that would not be used in the UK._

* * *

**Previously on Primeval, Series 6**

One year after Series 5, Matt Anderson's future double has been appearing to members of the ARC team, warning them of a dire future. He revealed to Abby Maitland that he's stuck in a time loop, and has seen the team's destruction play out a million times. He's manipulating the team in an attempt to bring about the one future he believes won't end in disaster. He's told Abby that she is destined to fail the team, bringing about the death of her new husband, Connor Temple.

As a result of Matt's machinations, Connor built a time machine that temporarily stranded the team in the past. A short-handed Lester brought in new team members, including mercenary Chris Newman, who worked against the team in the past and may have a strange connection to the ARC's founder, Nick Cutter, as well as former ARC employee Jennifer Lewis-Miller and Connor's old friend Duncan.

Also on Matt's advice, Captain Becker is considering breaking off his new relationship with Jess Parker, which is finally heating up. Meanwhile, on returning from the past, Connor and Abby impulsively decided to honeymoon where the time machine left them, in Southern California.

But great danger may lie with a shadowy organization the team discovered experimenting on anomalies in a town called Southfield, an enemy with international reach, destined to bring about a zombie-like plague that may yet destroy the world...

* * *

**Teaser**

"I wish I knew how to explain... why I have to do this. Why I'm so convinced it's the only way."

Connor Temple felt a little silly for thinking about the end of the world while sitting in his bathrobe, before an upper-level picture window at a hotel right on the beach, while watching the sky grow light over the Pacific Ocean, with his beautiful new wife asleep in the next room. In his defence, the world _was_ ending, so it was not an unreasonable thing to think about. Still... there were better times for it.

But there were no better times for saying what needed to be said. So he tried again, recording to an audio file on a laptop computer he'd charged to the ARC's expense account, and somehow despite the awkward situation and the incongruous setting, it all came spilling out:

"I'm a little cross, to tell you the truth. All the time we wasted, all the false starts, all the danger. And now we're finally together, we're married, and things are good. We've got our life. And now it ends."

Movement in the next room; Abby was awake. Connor prepared to shut down the program he'd been working on, but then he heard the shower running. He still had a few minutes.

"I feel like we deserve better," he said. "Like time owes us more than this. Of course, that's mad. If time owed anyone, it was Cutter, and look what happened to him.

"I should have said a lot of things sooner, Abby. I just thought we'd have more time..."

He looked down at the device in his hands, one of a couple of small devices he'd rigged up back at the ARC while working on his time machine. Fail-safe devices, in case their trip to the past failed to obtain the desired result. The mission had been a success, but the patients were slowly dying, in the manner of all mortal life.

"Right, then," Connor said. "There are certain things you need to know... about how it'll be triggered, how it all works..."

Connor spent several minutes describing the mechanics of time travel, then realised Abby probably wouldn't have the time to hear it all (if she even listened- she certainly never seemed to enjoy the time-travel speech when he gave it in person). He shrugged and decided he'd edit it down later. He was saying it all as much to put it into words, to work through his plan aloud, as to explain it to her.

He got so absorbed in the minutiae of cheating the Universe that he almost didn't hear when the door opened. He flipped down the laptop's cover and turned to see Abby, fresh from the shower and clad in a robe, with a towel wrapped around her hair.

"Did you enjoy that?"

"Mmm," she said. "There's nothing like a stay in the past to make you crave a hot shower."

"I remember..."

Abby sat down on the bed and started going through the drawers of the bedside table. She looked up at Connor. "Have you seen my mobile? I was going to call the ARC before we left today. Lester said Jenny Lewis is back."

Connor blinked. "Jenny?! How'd he ever manage that?"

"I dunno." Abby shrugged. "How does he manage to keep us?"

"That's simple- we're mad. I thought better of her."

Abby laughed; she held her newly-located mobile aloft in triumph before dropping it in the pocket of her robe. Then she crossed the room and draped her arms around Connor. He closed his eyes and relaxed into her touch, wishing this could be all there was, the only thing in the world he had to worry about...

"Are you really sure you want to go to this... theme park thing?"

Connor brightened. If he was going to have one last holiday with Abby, he was going to do it properly. That meant visiting all the places he'd always wished he had more time to see. Especially...

"Cosmic Studios? Absolutely! Abby, we're talking about the creative geniuses behind _Martian Outbreak, Captain Menace, Alien Soldier 1, 2, _and_ 3_... if we're not going to see them, what's the point of being in California?"

"Well, for one thing, your silly machine left us here." Abby lowered her voice and whispered into his ear, "I was just thinking... we _could_ lie around the beach all day. Or the room."

She bent down to kiss Connor's neck. He bit his lip and implored the Heavens:_ Really? You're doing _this_ to me? Now? Where were you for the last six years when I would have given my right arm for-_

But of course, it wasn't anyone's fault he was trying to fit a lifetime's worth of memories into two weeks. It wasn't anyone's fault but his own that he desperately needed one more component for his newly-assembled device, and going sightseeing would provide an innocent-seeming opportunity to shop. And he didn't know _who_ to blame for Abby's attitude of the last few days...

Connor turned in his chair and frowned at her. "You're being awfully nice to me."

"It's our honeymoon!" she protested. "And I'm often nice to you!"

"Not like this. Not... you know. All sweet and dewy-eyed."

"I'm happy!" Abby said, her eyes sparkling with either joy or tears. "What's wrong with that?"

Connor took her hands and drew her closer. "I just... feel like you're staring so hard 'cause you think I might disappear in the next five minutes."

That struck a nerve; he could see it on her face. A little of Abby's customary, more guarded persona reappeared as she pulled away.

"That's silly."

"No, it's not. I used to look at you like that. First six months of our relationship."

Abby made a face. "It was quite a bit different; we were in the Cretaceous, where I _actually might have been eaten_ at any moment! I'm not doing _that_! I'm just... being nice!"

Connor sighed; after so much time, he would have hoped they could be fully honest with each other. But he knew that was as much his fault as his wife's. Besides, they weren't really lying to each other, as much as to themselves.

"Abby..." he sighed.

"Look," she said, bustling off as though they'd never said anything at all, "if it's important, we'll go to the park. Whatever you want."

Connor watched her go. He thought of a million things to say, most of them sad and romantic. Somehow they all came out as: "You see, that's what I mean! How am I supposed to adjust to a world where you say things like _Whatever you want_? It's throwing off our whole dynamic!"

Abby waved off his argument and went into the other room to get ready. When the door closed, Connor cursed himself for leaving it at that. The worst part was, he was glad she was gone. It gave him a chance to finish recording his file. He opened the laptop and bent down near the microphone.

"Next order of business: What to do when the fail-safe sequence activates. You'll only have a short time..."

* * *

A few kilometres up the coast and a little distance out to sea, a small fishing boat called the _City of Angels_ began its morning routine. Sometimes during the peak season, its crew took charters of tourists fishing for yellowtail, tuna, seabass, even barricuda. Today they were working for themselves, just another round in the fisherman's endless quest to bring in more catch than he spent in fuel and upkeep.

The first mate on the small boat was a balding, overweight, greasy fellow who'd put out to sea so many times, he didn't even notice the deck swaying and bobbing beneath his feet. The deckhand was a much thinner, much younger man who looked slightly green on the choppier-than-usual sea. In practice, there wasn't any difference in their jobs save for an infinitesimal difference in pay and the fact that the more junior man had to take on the most unpleasant job available.

Doling out chum, for example. The older fellow watched while his young colleague hauled a bloody bucket of cut-up fish to the stern of the boat and methodically poured it overboard, sounding the dinner bell for undersea predators. A time-honoured technique, and generally effective, though on this particular morning it was the last thing they should have done. Indeed, it might have been the worst mistake they'd ever made, for far below them, a small crack had just opened in the fabric of time and space, a beacon glowing in the cold darkness of the ocean. This crack, called an anomaly, happened to connect their bit of ocean to a bit of ocean existing over four million years earlier, during the Pliocene Epoch. And when bits of chum floated through the glowing crack, it summoned a dangerous predator indeed...

But they didn't know that, yet. They were still absorbed in the details of their daily lives, the tangible challenge of fishing, the day-to-day banter of co-workers...

The first mate saw the deckhand stumble with a second bucket of chum. "Easy with that, kid! You need a hand?"

"That'd be great," said the deckhand. "Thanks!"

The first mate stuck the cigarette he'd been smoking between his teeth and slowly brought his hands together in a round of mock applause. The deckhand rolled his eyes.

"Thanks, Phil. You're a comedian."

The older man grunted. "When you been out more than two, three times, you'll be bitter as hell, too."

The deckhand brought the second bucket of chum to the top of the gunwale with a grunt. He turned and glared at the first mate. "I've been out more than three times."

"Aw, you barely made_ this_ trip. Hoist a few with the boys last night?"

"Nah," said the deckhand, as he began shovelling out the chum. "I met a woman."

The first mate snorted. "Didn't you say you met a woman last week?"

"I did! I do all right, Phil! How often are _you _getting-"

Whatever he was or wasn't getting was not audible in the depths of the sea, which was where their attention really should have been focused. It certainly wasn't audible to the huge, black shape that swam through- and through- and _through_ the anomaly with a few strokes of its powerful tail. A school of anchovies vacated the area in a flash, darting away in all directions, utterly panicked by the size of the new arrival. Unless any one of them was more than a million years old, they'd certainly never seen its like before...

Back on the _City of Angels_, the oblivious first mate responded to his colleague's question. "Listen, wise-ass, back in my day-"

"Yeah, when was that? 1890?"

They were so absorbed in their back-and-forth that they barely noticed when the deck began to shudder from the force of the disturbance beneath them. But the boat's grizzled captain noticed; he stepped outside of the cabin with his ears perked up like those of a veteran hunting dog. He scanned the horizon from one side to another, but saw nothing amiss...

"Ten bucks says you never had a date in your life!" the deckhand concluded.

"Quiet," the captain murmured.

At this point, the shuddering grew distinct enough that the first mate noticed it, too; he was no fool, just a bored man in a job that had long since become tedious. Fortunately, or perhaps not, his tedium was about to reach a permanent end...

"You hear me, Phil? I said-"

"Quiet, you idiot!" the captain snarled. He went to the port gunwale and looked over the side, as though he could peer straight down into the depthless blue and find the source of their trouble. The entire ship was now shuddering visibly, and even the deckhand's cocky smile fell away...

The captain stepped back from the gunwale. "What the hell _is _that?"

The first mate stood on the starboard side of the boat; he turned toward the water, in case perhaps the trouble was on his side. Then, suddenly, he _was_ no longer on his side of the boat- he was pitched overboard as something slammed into the _City of Angels_ from the port side, knocking him into the water with a tremendous_ splash_ befitting his weight.

His shipmates had no opportunity to retrieve him. Even as he coughed and sputtered and tried to tread water, he heard his captain's scream. Something rose above the surface;.it was a dorsal fin- a _huge_ fin, towering over the hull of the boat.

_That's a shark's fin,_ the first mate realised._ But there's no shark that size in these waters or in the world! It's got to be three times bigger than a Great White!_

Another fin announced the arrival of the huge shark's tail, which swept against the _City of Angels_ and capsized it. All three men were screaming now, completely at a loss, certain they were imagining or perhaps dreaming the terrible predator that had so easily swamped their boat...

But there was nothing in dreams as terrifying as the black eyes of the shark. The first mate saw them when it smashed through the _City of Angels'_ hull like so much kindling and angled straight from him, jaws larger than his entire body opened to their fullest extent...

He opened his mouth to scream again. He never made a sound. The enormous jaws came down around his chest. The first mate felt an oppressive pressure, then a very brief flash of incredible pain...

And then he was gone, along with his shipmates and the fish. Nothing remained but broken bits of wood and metal, and the wreckage of a boat now swiftly sinking beneath the waves.


	2. Act One

**Primeval 6.5 **("The Fall of Angels")

by qjay

___DISCLAIMER: Primeval was created by Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines. It does not belong to me. This is not-for-profit fan fiction, and no infringement is intended._

* * *

**Act One**

Across the ocean, the Anomaly Research Centre struggled along, short-staffed but valiantly pursuing its mission of protecting the human race from the sort of prehistoric threat that had just appeared a continent away, well beyond its usual range.

Jennifer Lewis-Miller had spent two years of her life pursuing said mission, once, and she'd never been so happy to be rid of anything in her life. It was something of a mystery to her, then, that she found herself once again in the control centre of the ARC, watching people who were practically strangers perform tasks with cutting-edge technology that once upon a time, Nick Cutter and Connor Temple would have put together on the run with tape and bailing wire...

_Life is strange. And, I sometimes think, more than justifiably perverse..._

Probably the least bothersome of the strangers, or at any rate the friendliest, was Jess Parker, the ARC's team co-ordinator, who stood at the massive bank of computers called the Hub running through one calculation after another. Beside her stood Connor's old friend Duncan, a portly, nervous sort of man who just happened to have the best brain for these things of anyone besides... well, Jess and Connor. Which didn't change the fact that his extreme social awkwardness and inability to tell what was appropriate to say to other humans had been getting on Jenny's last nerve for the better part of a week. At least he did know how to focus on business, after a fashion, and gave Jess someone else with whom to blather on about obscure scientific concepts.

"It's just no good," Jess was saying. "The power spiked almost as soon as we turned Connor's machine back _on_. We were lucky to get the team back from the Pleistocene alive..."

Duncan frowned. "What if we added some sort of fuse or automatic shut-off valve?"

"That would keep it from sustaining further damage, but I don't think we'll be able to get it working again until Connor returns."

Jenny smirked. "Good thing the future of the human race doesn't depend on it, then."

Jess smiled at the deadpan joke; she really did have an infectious smile. If working at the ARC had been entirely dealing with people like Jess, Jenny thought she would have tolerated it much better.

Then, of course, Duncan spoke. "Two weeks... on the beach... _with_ the hot blonde. Connor's got to be the luckiest nerd in the world. I still think he found a genie's lamp."

"Don't call Abby 'the hot blonde,'" Jess said. "She has a name. And when you've learned it, we'll work on getting you to stop calling me 'the even hotter one.'"

"He's taken to calling me by name," Jenny frowned. "Should I be offended?"

But Jess, in the manner of Jess, was already on to something else. "Isn't it odd that Lester approved their sudden holiday? I mean, considering how short-handed we are?"

"He _likes_ being short-handed," Jenny sighed. "It gives him an excuse to keep me here..."

Which was true. Jenny's retirement from the ARC had been abruptly cut short during the team's sojourn to the past, when Director James Lester had barged into Jenny's house offering her information about the puzzle that had all but consumed her life: the mysterious woman named Claudia Brown who seemed to have worked at the ARC before Jenny, her exact duplicate from another timeline, whom Jenny had thought to be fictional until she'd found a picture among Nick Cutter's personal affects. She'd agreed to Lester's deal because she'd lately been dreaming about Claudia- had, in fact, begun to wonder which of them was fiction- and she desperately wanted to put that particular spectre behind her for good.

Then, too, it had been a particularly good time to get away from her husband Michael, a kind and generous man whose vast reserves of understanding did not extend quite far enough to accept that his wife's whole life might be a false identity imposed by an altered timeline, and she might really be a stranger in love with a dead man... so, really, the problem with their marriage stemmed from his inflexibility.

The whole mess made Jenny's head hurt. She was grateful when her mobile rang, giving her an excuse to think about something else.

"Jenny Lewis," she said, turning it on. "Oh... Abby! My goodness, it's been too long! I couldn't believe it when I got your wedding invitation!"

Which was true, and not. Connor and Abby were among her oldest friends, and it had been perfectly obvious since the beginning of her tenure at the ARC that they were devoted to each other. But Jenny had been present when Connor first broached the idea of marriage (during her own wedding preparations, as it happened), and Abby had seemed terrified of the idea. Things changed quickly when you were risking your life to save the world every day, as Jenny knew better than anyone.

They were still having a ceremony, as their wedding (in the midst of danger) had been abrupt and unanticipated. Jenny had planned to decline their invitation; it wasn't that she didn't adore them, but Connor and Abby were part of a whole life Jenny preferred to forget. Now that she was back in it anyway, Jenny supposed there was no reason not to go. She hoped things would be calm enough for Michael to attend with her.

"If that's Connor or Abby," Jess interrupted, "have them bring me something."

Jenny frowned. "Such as?"

"I don't know; a souvenir. Brangelina's autographs!"

"I don't think they're in Hollywood right now," Duncan said. "I think they're off saving the world again."

"I understand it's a difficult job," Jess quipped.

"Abby, Jess Parker says... wait, what is that noise in the background?" Jenny listened. "A _roller coaster_? I thought you were on your honeymoon...! Oh, Connor's idea. Of course. He turned down _what_ for it? Staying in the room? Did he understand what you meant? I don't know; it's Connor! I thought he might not!

"No- no, I certainly don't want details. Just... Abby, just enjoy yourselves. We're holding down the fort here... me? No, I'm fine. I'm back because- well, never mind now. I'll explain everything when you return. That's right..."

* * *

"...we've got a lot of catching-up to do," said Jenny's voice through Abby Maitland-Temple's mobile.

At least, that was what Abby thought she said. The noise at the Cosmic Studios theme park was nearly intolerable; there was a reason Abby preferred to spend her free time in a quiet reptile house, or among lions on the open plains. But Connor was in his element; he stood a little distance away, quibbling over souvenirs with a vendor.

"No... got that one. Got that one. Oh! Captain Menace T-shirt! ...got it. But not in this colour!"

Abby sighed. If her friend was all right, there was no point in trying to battle the noise much longer. "All right, Jenny... just wanted to check in. I've missed you, too. Hold on." She held the phone away from her ear. "Connor, did you want to say anything to Jenny?"

Connor looked away from the vendor with an oddly blank expression on his face; perhaps the fellow behind him in line, the tough-looking one in the dark suit, was getting impatient.

"Um... maybe."

"Well, hurry up, then! Or I could give her a message..."

"That's a good idea," Connor said. He started walking toward her. Oddly, the tough-looking fellow came with him.

That was when Abby felt something sticking into her back. Something cold and metal- the muzzle of a gun! She felt a breath of air on her neck; whoever was behind her seemed to be the mirror image of the fellow walking with Connor. He took away her mobile and closed it, ending the call, as Connor was herded next to her.

_Are they from Southfield? How did they know we were here? What do they want?_

"So, I was thinking," Connor murmured. "That message should probably say 'Help.'"

Abby made a face. "Little late, isn't it?"

The fellow with the gun prodded her forward. "This way. Either of you makes any trouble, the other one will regret it. Understand?"

_Oh, I understand,_ Abby thought._ I hope you're really fond of that gun, because you'll be having it for breakfast..._

That didn't seem a very healthy thing to say aloud, so she shared a long, worried glance with Connor and walked in the direction indicated.

* * *

Back at the ARC, Jenny frowned as her connection to Abby went dead. "Abby? Abby, hello? Are you- hmm. Dropped the call."

Given that she could barely understand her friend for all the noise anyway, that probably wasn't the worst thing. Jenny turned off her mobile and tucked it away, even as the control centre doors opened. She turned with the others-

"Oh, lovely," said Duncan. "The first team's returned. I suppose it's back to clipping articles about anomalies for me."

Jenny smiled- that didn't sound like such a bad thing, either- as several of the Anomaly Research Centre's lost lambs tramped through the doors: Matt Anderson and Emily Merchant looked exhausted, but none the worse for wear. But Jess bypassed these without a second glance and aimed straight for...

"Becker!"

She ran to the newly-returned security captain and embraced him. Becker hugged back, but appeared awkward. Jenny remembered that look; she hadn't known Becker long before her departure from the ARC, but he'd just been fitting in with the team, and she'd seen the look often.

Jess drew back. "Is something wrong?"

"It's... we'll talk later, all right?"

"Er... yeah, sure."

Jenny tried to hide her amusement. She'd heard a lot of what she would have called gossip about Jess and Becker- would have, save that most of it came from Jess herself, who prattled on about him given the slightest provocation. They seemed an odd couple to Jenny; Jess was somewhat younger than the grizzled soldier, and very... enthusiastic. But maybe that was just what Becker needed, someone who knew how to have a bit of fun.

In any case, the awkward moment gave way to Becker noticing her. "Jenny Lewis? Is it really you?"

She smiled. "It's been ages, Captain Becker."

Becker approached Jenny and hugged her- just in an _old friends_ sort of way, but it wasn't nearly as stilted as his greeting to Jess. The team coordinator seemed to notice, and frowned as she returned to her work. Jenny felt bad, though she couldn't see how the whole thing was in any way her fault.

"Never thought I'd see you in here again," Becker was saying. "Haven't gone mad, have you?"

"It's a distinct possibility..." Jenny turned to another newcomer, whom she dimly recognised from the incident at her wedding. "Emily, right? Welcome back."

The other woman, who'd always seemed a little odd to Jenny, only shrugged. "_Back_ is a matter of perspective. We actually passed my time on the way here, so you might as well say 'welcome forward.'"

Jenny frowned. "Did anyone else understand that?"

"I did!" said Duncan. "It was clever!"

"Don't mind her," Matt sighed. "She's become an honorary nerd."

He squeezed Emily's hand- Jenny seemed to remember they'd been a bit more than friendly- before stepping away to greet Jess.

"Have you got a minute? We need to talk."

Jess glanced at Becker again as though she wanted to say something, but shrugged and allowed Matt to guide her off to the side.

The time and date were visible on the Hub's readout, just past Jess's shoulder, and Jenny performed a double-take when she saw it.

"We'll have to catch up later," she told Becker. "I have an appointment with that fellow, Newman. He's offered to train me on those EMD's of yours. Their targeting is really sensitive."

"Er- yeah, it is." Becker frowned. "Couldn't postpone that, could you? Matt and I need a word with Newman."

"It's just target practice," Jenny said. "Do you think he's going to stun me and carry me off?"

From the way the captain of security arched his eyebrows, he didn't think that out of the question. But he thought again. "I suppose we should bring it to Lester first... might not hurt to keep him occupied. Just make sure one of my guards is nearby at all times. And... watch your back, all right?"

Jenny frowned. "Of course. I'll be fine, Becker. Though I'm not sure why you lot need posh lasers. In my day, we just used _guns_."

Becker smiled. "When dinosaurs roamed the Earth..."

"Isn't that every day?" said Emily.

Jenny smiled and turned toward the door. As she walked away, she heard Duncan making another attempt to fit into the mix by introducing himself to Emily.

"Hi, there. I'm Duncan. I'm a nerd myself, so we should have a good deal in common. Not that it matters. Like every woman here, you're well out of my league, so why am I still talking?"

"No one's quite sure," Becker said.

Jenny shook her head. On the list of things she'd ever found herself thinking about her return,_ I hope Connor comes back because he's so much more sensitive and sophisticated_ was nowhere to be found. Nevertheless, it was an accurate summation of her feelings, which only went to show that in the ARC's world of temporal fluctuation and constant danger, anything really was possible...

* * *

Matt Anderson watched Jenny exit the control centre and hoped she wasn't going where he was more or less sure she was going. That there was a connection of some sort between her and Newman was obvious; that it seemed to be rooted in the other's mysterious knowledge of the ARC and its denizens was even more apparent. Which made it more important than ever that he find out exactly who and what their new team-mate represented.

Meanwhile, Jess had her own problems. "Don't know what's wrong with Becker, do you? He seemed a little off."

"He's... Becker," Matt sighed. "Sorry, but I can't get into it right now. What I need is anything you can find out about Chris Newman- fast."

Jess stared at him blankly for about half a second, probably thinking anything they were authorised to know about Newman was in his file, to which Matt had access. Then the nature of his request seemed to dawn on her.

"Oh, no. Matt, no! You know my rule! I'm not your private hacker!"

"This isn't for me, it's for the ARC." Matt took a deep breath. "During our encounter with Southfield in the past, I heard them talking about Newman. He worked for them, Jess."

Jess frowned. "We knew that, didn't we? He has their technology and a shady past, all of which were cleared with Lester. Did they say anything to indicate he was still loyal?"

Matt felt as though he'd bit into something sour, and it showed on his face. Jess had hit on the crux of his dilemma. "No... in fact, they said he betrayed them."

"Well, there you are. For all we know, Abby and Emily owe their lives to him!"

"He still lied, or at least kept details from us, and I need to know why. There's something big coming, and this man is dangerous. I feel it in my bones."

"I'm not so sure," Jess said. At first, Matt thought it was just her usual sunshine-and-flowers optimism, but she looked and sounded thoughtful. "I spoke to him the other day, and he seemed more... sad to me. Lonely. If you really want to know his past, I don't suppose you've tried talking with him? Making a connection?"

"I connect with people I trust," Matt said. "You think I should trust him? Give me a reason."

He hadn't exactly meant to do it, but in framing it like that- as an act of altruism, a way of _helping_ Newman rather than spying on him- he'd found the way to Jess's heart. She gave a curt nod and turned aside.

Matt exhaled a long breath. Now that things were going right, maybe they had a fighting chance of bringing the situation with Southfield back under control before it was too late... and before his own, future doppelgänger did something to muck it up again.

* * *

Whoever the armed men were, they didn't seem to have any trouble cutting through Cosmic Studios' perpetually-aggressive crowds. It was almost as though they parted before them- or maybe a third agent was going before them, preparing the way. Abby had been almost certain there would be a chance to break away and escape in the chaos of the park, but by the time they stepped out of the warm California sunshine into the cool of an indoor boat ride, it was clear these men waited on line for no one. She and Connor were shepherded straight to a waiting boat, which road a mechanical track through a darkened tunnel.

"Get in," one of the men said.

Abby obliged, and Connor slid in next to her as their captors boarded the boat behind them. One of them gestured to make it clear the guns were still trained on their backs.

Connor sighed. "Somehow when I picture us going through the Tunnel of Love in my mind, it's always very different..."

"The other boats are going," Abby said, noting that the boats in front of them on line were now several lengths ahead. "What are we waiting for?"

A moment later, the shadows of the boat pavilion grew even darker, as someone stood over their boat, blotting out the last of the sun. It was a woman- a rather attractive black woman in businesslike attire. She carried no weapon, but she nodded to the guards, who clearly deferred to her.

"Scoot over," she said, in an American accent.

Abby and Connor reluctantly obeyed, and she boarded the boat with them. Now it set off- on what Abby noted seemed to be a separate track from the others. You couldn't tell unless you were sitting in the boat, looking straight down at the works.

Loud, high-pitched music played all around them as the ride kicked into gear. It was all Abby could do not to cover her ears.

"Is this meant to be torture? Couldn't you just shoot us?"

"It's the _Theme from Undersea Predator_," Connor mused. "I've got the soundtrack!"

Abby ignored for the moment the strong probability that she'd married the world's most inept genius and focused on the woman. "Look, I don't know who you are, but-"

"I'm someone who can make you disappear with a phone call. Show a little respect."

Connor glared at her. "So much for the brochures promising me the 'Merriest Holiday on Earth'..."

"Just relax, kids," said the woman. "You'll get your answers soon enough."

The boats crawled forward into the darkened tunnel. Abby tried to keep hold of her temper as they sailed past display after display filled with animatronic sea creatures- presumably the stars of the film on which the ride was based. Under normal circumstances, she found this kind of thing tedious. To be forced through it literally at gunpoint was humiliating. Even Connor seemed to have lost the joy of the experience...

The woman's mobile chimed, and she answered it. "Lisa Barrett."

Abby arched an eyebrow. _So, she's not_ that_ reluctant to tell us her name... on the other hand, neither was Elizabeth Evans. Perhaps Southfield's too powerful to worry about that- or perhaps she doesn't intend us living long enough to talk..._

Lisa's conversation continued: "It's confirmed? You're sure? Dammit! The American isn't going to like that... okay, assemble the field team. Tell 'em we've got a delivery incoming. What? No, we didn't get 'the big, strong one.'" She cast a critical glance at Connor. "Definitely not."

"Oi!" said Abby; it wasn't as though it was untrue, but she didn't think her husband ought to be insulted on his honeymoon...

Lisa turned off her phone and smiled. "You can tell your friend Becker he's got a fan club."

"You know Becker?" Connor said. "You know us?"

"I was recruited from the CIA," Lisa said. "We know everything."

Abby said, "If you're an American agent, why did you call someone _else_ 'the American?'"

The other woman shrugged. "That's just a nickname. Picked it up from my boss, as a joke."

Connor said, "Who's your-"

"Watch out. Here comes the good part."

Connor turned back to see what Abby had already noticed, slightly to her dread: their track was branching off from the main ride, down a second, even darker tunnel, which proceeded to angle downward as they picked up speed, with the boat full of armed men trailing behind them...

_Lovely,_ Abby thought. _Connor was already getting motion sick from the roller coaster and candy floss..._

On cue, he said something that was probably meant to be some variation on _This is really cool,_ but trailed off into a sick-sounding gurgle...

Lisa laughed. "You kids are married, right? I'd hang onto each other real tight."

"You're making a big mistake," Abby said.

"Um... Abby? Abby, look..."

Connor pointed straight ahead, to where the downward angle turned into a precarious drop. He yelped and held onto Abby, who didn't mind a bit, as at least that kept her attached to her seat. Her stomach lurched as the bottom seemingly fell out from under them and they plunged downward into darkness,, racing down an endless tunnel with no breaks, fast and then faster, with Lisa Barrett laughing the whole time-

All this gave way to an impact and a sudden splash that drenched them all with water. Abby had just narrowed it down to two possibilities: Their captors were park employees, secretly testing the greatest thrill ride of all time... or they were completely insane. They floated now on a placid lake in a wide-open chamber, darkness surrounding them on all sides.

"You understand, this isn't the day-to-day entrance," Lisa said conversationally. "I'm under orders to show you a good time."

"Wasn't so bad," Connor gasped, though his slurred voice belied the words. "That wasn't so bad..."

"Hold that thought," said Abby.

She'd just seen something in the darkness: A lumpy, writhing shape, barely a silhouette in black. It was snaking toward them, through the water.

"I know Undersea Terror had really great special effects," Connor said, "but that's ridiculous."

To Abby, who'd spent her whole life observing creatures, it was clear this newest obstacle wasn't a convincing robot, like the others; it was _alive,_ and it was nearly upon them...

It accelerated as it came the last few metres, bringing with it a sudden surge of water, a wave that nearly swamped the little boats, and then something lurched out of the water, a serpentine neck that rose above the boats, then arced downward to peer at them with cold, curious eyes...

Reptile eyes. One of the men in the second boat threw something- a fish, Abby realized, and suddenly the neck looped around and snapped it up in the air, exactly like a dolphin performing at an aquarium...

_It's a small plesiosaur,_ Abby realised. _From the proportions, possibly a juvenile..._

"You people created Nessie, right?" Lisa grinned. "Meet his American cousin. You've got your menagerie, we've got ours."

"You mean this whole thing is a cover for the American version of the ARC?" Abby elbowed Connor in the ribs. "I thought you knew these people!"

"Um... nope. Never met them. Visited a bloke in Canada..."

"Yes, Evan Cross," said Lisa. "We have that on file. We're a little annoyed you went north of the border first."

Connor held her eyes, any amusement he'd once felt at the situation long gone. "To tell you the truth, I was always a bit afraid of what America would want to do with the anomalies."

"With good reason, I'd say," Abby added. "How do we know you're not from Southfield?"

Lisa sighed. "Stop calling it Southfield, for one thing. It's annoying. Southfield is just one lab maintained by a covert organisation potentially infiltrating dozens of world governments. And believe me, we're on it."

"What do you call it, if not Southfield?" Abby asked.

"At present, we've got them as Uncategorised Threat #0978-E."

"I think we'll stick with Southfield," Connor said.

"Even if you're not them, you're wasting your time," said Abby. "We're not gonna betray our government, or tell you anything classified."

Lisa stared at her, annoyed or impressed. "Give us a chance, kids. Have a look around. You might see something here you like."

"I'd like it if you stopped calling us 'kids,'" Abby said.

"What?" Lisa blinked. "Oh... sorry! That's something else I picked up from my boss. He still thinks of you as his responsibility."

"What are you talking about?"

The chamber reverberated with a sudden, metallic clank. The darkness fell away as wide, double-doors at one end of the chamber parted, revealing a modern facility behind them, presumably located beneath the amusement-park attraction. Metal walkways and ladders overlooked a sort of dock, into which Lisa guided their boats. The whole thing gave the impression of being _almost_ modern- perhaps not as modern as the new ARC, but on par with the old one. If Lisa Barrett thought they'd be awed, she clearly wasn't familiar with how far the operation had progressed during the tenure of the otherwise-regrettable Philip Burton...

_Good_, Abby thought, deciding what their captors didn't know, wouldn't hurt them.

Connor might have been thinking along the same lines, but he made a show of being impressed. "Nice place. What d'you call it?"

"This is Area 94," Lisa said.

"Ninety-four?" Connor scowled. "The official Internet count is only seventy-one! Just how many aliens are you people hiding?"

"Just one that I know of... and look, here he comes now."

Abby didn't know what to make of that, not even when she heard boot heels ringing on the catwalk above them. Even when she first heard the voice, she didn't make the connection. It had been too long, and too many parts of her memory had become too painful...

"Mister and Mrs. Temple," said a voice that sounded like home, "welcome to America."

Connor touched Abby's arm and gestured for her to look up: A couple of American soldiers in uniforms similar to those of the ARC stood overlooking them, and their leader...

Their leader was a former London detective constable named Danny Quinn.


	3. Act Two

**Primeval 6.5 **("The Fall of Angels")

by qjay

___DISCLAIMER: Primeval was created by Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines. It does not belong to me. This is not-for-profit fan fiction, and no infringement is intended._

* * *

**Act Two**

The raptor was hunting her.

Jenny could just glimpse it beyond a grove of trees, watching her with unblinking eyes. She tried to relax, keep her muscles taut but not tense, her aim steady. A long second stretched out...

The raptor leaped at her through the trees, covering the ground between them in seconds. Jenny closed one eye, forced herself to wait an extra heartbeat, and fired twice. Struck twice directly between the eyes, the raptor... faded as though it had never been.

Jenny relaxed and pulled off the 3D glasses that made the image projected on the screen before her look so incredibly real. She turned to Chris Newman, who stood a little distance away, watching with a critical eye. She might have been mistaken, but she thought he looked slightly impressed.

"Connor put this together, didn't he? It's just like a video game."

"It's real enough for our purposes," Newman said. "You're a good shot."

"I'd have said I was rusty. I was aiming for its midsection."

The mercenary shrugged. "Everyone does that at first. It's a whole different kind of kickback, makes you change your aim at the last moment. Here, I'll show you..."

As the program started again, Jenny eased into her firing stance- then tensed up as Newman stood very close behind her and adjusted the position of her arms. It wasn't meant to be intimate; he was all-business, but it did feel rather like an embrace. And, she thought, a familiar one...

Jenny took a deep breath. _You're imagining things... just concentrate. This is business. This is about staying alive long enough to get home to Michael, and that is_ all.

"See, that braces you better. Now, just fire as normal."

Jenny nodded. Another electronic raptor had appeared in the foliage, at perhaps a thirty-degree angle from the first one's position. She shifted her aim, waited. It pounced at her, programmed to move suddenly and unpredictably. But Jenny was prepared, tracked it like a clay pigeon, and fired. The raptor vanished before it ever got close- struck dead-centre.

"Got you!" she grinned, pleased to have recovered her old form, if only for ego's sake. "That's more like it..."

She turned and nearly hugged the man behind her. Their eyes met for a single heartbeat, during which she suddenly felt they were standing much too close.

Newman took a long step back. "Sorry. That was-"

"No, it's just- you know. Happily married."

"Believe me," Newman said, as he took her place on the firing line with an EMD rifle of his own, "I'm not interested."

Jenny arched her eyebrows; she supposed it was ego again, the pat way he said it, that rankled her. "Good, then."

Newman put on the goggles and took his stance. Jenny could see the raptor on the screen, though not in 3D. He shot it at a very great distance, a shot she might have been able to make at her absolute peak- or perhaps not. The difficulty level, which was self-adjusting, amped up to produce two raptors.

Jenny thought it might be a good time to broach an uncomfortable subject, if only to bother his arm. "You do know something about me."

If that bothered Newman, he didn't show it. He shot the first raptor, turned, and got the second in mid-air. The simulator amped up again, displaying _three_ creatures this time.

Jenny pressed on. "When I got here, I was... confused. You seemed to understand. Why is that?"

"That's just-"

Newman shot the first raptor, but hesitated a beat too long before turning on the second. He missed his shot, and the third raptor pounced from his opposite side. The screen turned red, with a gaudy, blood-soaked "Game Over" message that must have been programmed by Connor.

In the real world, Newman took off the glass and scowled at her. "That's nothing. I'm intuitive."

"You're certainly not, not about people. Try again."

Newman took his firing stance again as the machine rebooted. Then he paused it and turned with an air of sudden decision.

"You have dreams of another life. You're... yourself, but a different person, in a different world. Everything is changed."

"How do you know that?"

Something flicked across his face- Jenny couldn't tell what- but it struck her as similar to the _deja vu_ she'd experienced in his arms.

Newman shook it off. "Lucky guess. This lesson's over; you're already a better shot than most of these amateurs."

He turned on his heel, still clutching the EMD rifle, and left the program running as he retreated at a fast walk. Jenny followed, determined not to be deflected so easily.

"You know something. I'll find out what it is. Lester promised he'd help me."

Newman scoffed. "Lester promises a lot of things."

"Do you think it's a joke?" Jenny seethed with frustration at his attitude. "Are you amused by this- this_ hell_ I'm going through, doubting who I am? If you do know something, you owe it to me as a colleague to-"

He whirled. "You are an infuriating woman, Claudia Brown! What makes you think I owe you any damn thing?"

He knew it was a mistake as soon as he said it, as though it hadn't been a conscious decision, hadn't been _him_ speaking at all. They stood facing each other, frozen. Jenny felt she couldn't even breathe.

"What did you call me?"

Newman stared at her for a long moment, and she stared right back. Then he slammed his EMD into the rack beside the door and strode from the target range as fast as his legs would carry him.

Jenny's own legs felt like rubber. She supposed she was making progress, in an unexpected sort of way, in her stated goal of finding out who she was. She'd never stopped to consider what might happen if she got an unexpected answer...

* * *

A continent away, the weather was warm and sunny with a chance of remaining warm and sunny until California broke off from North America and floated out to sea. Dozens of beach-goers, thinking that latter possibility remote, were out enjoying the day: Playing volleyball and swimming, children making sand castles. The usual sort of thing, interrupted by the usual sort of nuisance.

A young man on a personal water-craft roared through the swimming area, drenching several bystanders with his prodigious wake and bothering the eardrums of all.

One fellow, who'd been close to the craft's trajectory, sputtered as he surfaced and shook his fist, summing up the feelings of all: "Damn fool! Get that thing out of here!"

The young man laughed, made a gesture which was definitely not conciliatory, and roared out to sea on his modern chariot.

Once out of sight of the swimming area, he slowed. What point being impressively devil-may-care if no one noticed and... well, cared? He saw a weather buoy floating in the distance and set out for it, timing himself against no opponent in particular.

He won the imaginary race, as always, and laughed as he turned a slow circle around the buoy, wondering if it would be worth a laugh to strafe the unsuspecting one more time. He swept the salt water out of his eyes and scanned the endless blue horizon.

"_Awesome_," he grinned, and gunned his engine-

A half-second too late. If he'd been looking in the other direction, he might have realised a large section of the horizon was not so placid, was actually a wake even more impressive than his own. It threw him off his water-craft, then submerged again before he got his wits about him.

His head broke the surface of the water. He gasped and coughed for breath, supposing he'd been taken off-guard by... a wave or a motorboat. He saw his water-craft floating out to sea, but wrapped both arms around the weather buoy before suffering the same fate himself...

He was just about recovered enough to undertake the swim to retrieve his craft, when another wake hammered home and swamped the buoy He surfaced again with lungs burning, disoriented and terrified. It was like something was doing it on purpose, _circling_ him...

"Help!" he gasped. "What the hell just...? Somebody help!"

He'd gone too far out to sea. The beach-goers, even those who might not have been inclined to say _good riddance_, were too far away to hear. They would read about his disappearance the next day, some of them, and perhaps it would cross their mind to remember they'd seen him, and to wonder about the manner of his death.

It's possible one of them guessed "devoured alive by a 20-metre shark, which surfaced suddenly to swallow him in a single gulp, along with an inoffensive weather buoy, and then vanished beneath the waves without a trace."

Possible, but highly unlikely.

* * *

Matt encountered Chris Newman as the new addition to his team was departing the training room, and fell into step with him in the corridor. Newman glanced at him, grimaced, and kept walking.

"How was the lesson?" Matt asked.

"I realise you'd like me better if I said something harmless and non-committal like 'great' or 'fine,' but the truth is, it's none of your damn business and I dislike answers that don't convey my meaning."

"The performance of this team_ is_ my business, including range scores... and potential conflicts of interest. On that note, would you care to visit Lester's office with me?"

Newman grunted. "Can't imagine you think I would, so I'll take that as an order."

"Glad we understand each other," said Matt, and he led them down a new corridor.

A few minutes later, they arrived in James Lester's office, to find the ARC's director standing before his desk with arms crossed and Becker standing beside him; a rare moment of solidarity for the ARC these days. If Newman was disconcerted, he didn't show it.

"James," he said, nodding. "Captain Becker. Shouldn't you be off filling the holes I found in your security grid?"

"Shouldn't you be in a corner somewhere, cowering from a dinosaur?"

Newman stopped in the middle of the room, allowing the ARC veterans to surround him in a rough semi-circle. He seemed to realise he was boxed in, though come to that, he could have fought his way past Lester easily enough.

"Look, what's this about?"

"It's about the past- or the future, depending on point of view." Matt held his eyes. "We know about your work for Southfield. They were hunting you in the Pleistocene."

"Yeah, they were." Newman nodded. "That was when I severed my ties with them. For me, that was about five years ago- around the time Oliver Leek asked me to round up a mammoth to keep Cutter's team occupied. James, I'm sure_ you_ remember that."

If he was the least physically imposing man in the confrontation, Lester made up for it by the strength of his disapproval. "Sorry, was that meant as a joke? I do seem to recall nearly dying, so perhaps the humour escapes me."

"He's lying," Becker said. "Abby told us she encountered you in the past, still working for them."

"Abby Maitland, yes. I've been waiting five years to see her again. That was_ fun_. We should have more team outings."

Matt grabbed a fistful of his shirt. "I promise you, you won't be enjoying this for long. Abby and Emily could have died because of you!"

"That's wrong," Newman said. "All I did was protect them- ask them yourself."

"Yeah, you protected them," Becker said. "To set up Southfield's trap- which they sprung on us!"

"Wrong again. Actually I left their employ before the trap was sprung. If they hadn't been hunting me across time, they'd have had a lot more resources to use on you, and your little trip wouldn't have ended so happily. So... you're welcome."

Matt took a breath, tried to think. "Let's say you're telling the truth. Why did you quit them?"

"You won't believe me."

"Try us."

The mercenary shrugged. "All right. Don't say I didn't warn you. I quit what you call Southfield because I liked them."

"Who, Abby and Emily?" Becker snorted. "You expect us to believe you abandoned a paying job out of sentiment? That seems unlikely."

"Perhaps you don't realise how seldom I meet someone I like."

"Come on, you can do better than that. Try again."

"All right, I will. There_ is_ more, I suppose." Newman looked away, shook his head. Matt didn't know why, but he thought there was _something _sincere there, if not absolute honesty. "I didn't like what we'd done to Abby Maitland- Leek and Helen Cutter and the rest. I saw her twice, once when I trapped the mammoth, and then when she was sighted in the Pleistocene- from my perspective, just a few days later. It had been five years for her, and she was entirely different. Angrier, tougher, sadder. She was far more willing to kill me than I think she realised."

Matt arched an eyebrow. "You mean, she was turning into you."

"Into a match for me, at any rate." Newman looked from Matt to Becker. "I don't think I have to tell either of you what that costs a person.

"I was at the end of my rope with Southfield anyway- they expect far too much unquestioning loyalty for too little reward. When Abby refused my offer of protection- so to speak- I realised this little civilian girl was standing up to them, and I didn't have the guts. So I bolted, and I've been a reliable source of information about Southfield ever since." He nodded to Lester. "It might surprise you, James, how many of the hints you've gleaned about them over the years actually came from me.

"Now, does that satisfy you gentlemen?"

Matt, Newman, and Lester shared a long look. Finally the director cleared his throat.

"Try to be a bit more reliable a source in future, Mr. Newman. That's all for now."

The mercenary turned and left without a backward glance. The room became very quiet on his departure. Finally, Becker stirred.

"We're not really buying this, are we?"

"I'm not sure," Lester said. "I didn't bring in Newman because he was a saint- I did it because I realised we were in a fight and I thought he'd be useful. As far as I can see, that's still the case."

Matt felt caught between the two opinions. He did think there was more Newman wasn't telling, but on the other hand... hadn't he reacted to Abby and Connor and Becker the same way, when he'd first arrived at the ARC? He'd certainly taken to Emily right away. They'd nearly turned him from his purpose, and he'd been a lot more devoted to his mission than any paid mercenary. Maybe it was true, or at least... not false. Until Jess came up with something, maybe that was enough.

"We'll keep an eye on him," Matt said, "for now."

"Lovely," Becker sighed. "I say throat, by the way."

"Nah. She doesn't waste those on just anybody. The stomach'll do."

"What are you doing?" said Lester.

Becker shrugged. "Taking bets on where Abby will kick him when she returns. You know it's coming; there's a pool of sorts."

"Ah." Lester looked away, then turned. "Has anyone bet on a swift kick in the backside?"

"Not yet. I'll put you down for a fiver."

"Done."

Matt sighed. Whether or not Lester's prediction proved prophetic, he thought it sounded like a pretty good idea. One could only hope...

* * *

Connor kept staring for a long time after he pointed out their host to Abby. He hadn't seen Danny Quinn for two years, since his former team leader and friend had returned through an anomaly to the past. He'd been pursuing his unstable brother Patrick, the search for whom had been the obsession of Danny's life. Under normal circumstances, Connor would have been thrilled to see him back and well. But to encounter him here, in a foreign installation, surrounded by guns, looming down in them with a look of rage or disdain on his face...

"Danny... I don't believe it. What's going on?"

"As if you didn't know. Well, I'll tell you what, you two. I've been waiting a long time for this." He descended the ladder a step at a time, the sound of his boots ringing through the wide chamber. "After all this time, everything we've been through...

"After we saved the world together..." Danny dropped down to the bottom of the ladder, turned, and approached them a step at a time, growling, "How can you have the nerve to stand there... look me in the eye... and not _get over here and give me a hug_?"

Danny started laughing, and Abby joined in. She rushed out of the boat and hugged Danny, while Connor remained a step behind, because- well, he knew which of them _he'd_ prefer to hug first. But then he embraced Danny and shook his head in appreciation of a well-executed fake.

"Ah, come on!" Danny said. "I didn't really fool you, did I?"

"Well, after that reception..." Abby said.

"Er, yeah. Sorry about that. I did tell those fellows to treat you nicely. I think they thought I was being sarcastic. I'll talk to them."

"But... finding you here," Connor said. "It's a big surprise, isn't it?"

"Me?" Danny scoffed. "You two turn up _married,_ and I'm the surprise?"

Connor frowned at the ring still prominently displayed on Abby's finger. "I_ told_ you not to wear it about if you wanted to keep this quiet."

"Well, I didn't think we'd meet anyone _here_!"

"We knew already," Danny said, waving for peace. "Lisa knows everything."

Connor and Abby turned to Danny's assistant. In the excitement, they'd nearly forgotten about the businesslike American. She smirked at them, glad to have her superiority affirmed. Danny put an arm around each of them and guided them toward a door.

As they walked, Abby broached the bigger question: "We thought you were looking for your brother."

"I was," Danny said. "Took me nearly a year, but I finally caught up with him."

"But wasn't he quite dangerous?"

Danny's smile faltered, but just for a second. "He's getting help now. He's... under control. Come on; I've got something to show you."

With Danny in the lead and Lisa bringing up the rear, Connor and Abby walked down a long, sterile corridor, again clearly modelled on the ARC Danny remembered. Connor gauged the budget that must have gone into such a thing- not difficult for the man who built the ARC's computer- and realised it was a high-level operation, if not quite state-of-the-art. So why was _Danny_ running it for a foreign government?

"I don't understand," he said aloud. "If you're back, why didn't you call us? You could have had a job with the ARC in a second!"

"I dunno about that," Danny said. "Lester's never really liked me."

"Lester doesn't like anyone, but he knows your worth," Abby said.

Danny looked from one of them to the other and shrugged. "Look, the ARC doesn't need me any more. It's Matt Anderson's team now, and he's a good man. The two of you will soon have teams of your own..."

"I don't know about that!" Connor laughed; he'd taken more initiative in the last year, even led a team a few times, temporarily. That fellow in Canada probably thought him quite important. But Danny ought to know better...

"I do. I've been watching you. You've come a long way." Danny turned to Abby with a gleam in his eye. "You proposed to him, though, right?"

"Oh, yeah. 'Course."

Danny snapped his fingers. "Just won a bet with myself. Anyway, there I was: Newly-returned time-traveller- again- and no job. Luckily the last anomaly landed me in California, where Lisa found me."

Connor frowned at their American guide, who turned away not quite in time to hide her smile. It was the first genuine, non-sarcastic expression he'd ever seen on her face, but it was gone just as quickly.

"We'd made several attempts to get into the anomaly game," she said, "but we never established a team as successful as yours. We needed an experienced hand."

Danny shrugged. "Right place, right time, I guess."

Connor saw by Abby's expression that she didn't quite believe that; he hadn't decided whether he thought she was being too suspicious. But she raised a good point a moment later.

"Coincidence seems to be going around. Both of us being here, for example."

The sarcasm returned to Lisa's smile. "Is that coincidence? Why did you come here, Abby?"

"Connor wanted to come."

Lisa turned to him. "And why did you want to come?"

Connor shrugged. "Got a brochure. And then an e-mail. Several e-mails, actually. Half my favourite films are represented here!"

"More than half," said Danny. "Connor, I've seen your DVD collection- and Lisa has right of approval with the people who built our cover. I had her emphasize things you'd like."

Abby narrowed her eyes. "You mean you lured us here?"

"Well, lured him and hoped he'd drag you along. You took your time about it. I thought we were going to have to build Connorland to get your attention."

Connor exchanged a glance with his wife. "We've been sort of busy..."

_Connorland would be cool, though,_ he thought as they passed into Area 94's version of the ARC's control centre. Here, perhaps, he really was a bit impressed. The main display didn't appear quite as advanced as the Hub, but the room was filled with the best surveillance technology American defence money could buy. Some of the gadgets, Connor hoped he'd get a chance to look at later...

And those weren't the only things in the room worth looking at. He did a double-take at the woman standing near the almost-Hub: a tall, gorgeous, perfectly built blonde who might have been a Hollywood starlet. She was dressed, or nearly dressed, in civilian clothes: Cutoff jeans and a low-cut, gossamer blouse that left a minimum to the imagination...

Abby wrinkled her nose. "Looks like a tourist got past your guard..."

"Wait!" Connor said as his brain jarred back into operation. "I saw that woman in the park! I think she was following us!"

"You're sure?" said Abby.

"_Believe_ me, I'm sure. I saw her several times."

Danny cleared his throat. "Thin ice, mate, thin ice..."

"I couldn't take my eyes off her!"

"_Really_," said Abby, in a tone that would have turned the Pacific Ocean to ice.

Connor glanced at her, then at the beautiful tourist, and realised what he'd done. "I was concerned for her. I thought she might get a sunburn."

"Connor, for your own good, _stop talking_!"

Lisa laughed as they approached the woman. "Temples, meet Sharon Clarke, one of my best field agents."

"We've just about met," Sharon said, offering her hand to Connor with a amused sort of smile. "I apologize for my attire. When people are keeping _you_ under surveillance, they rarely notice you doing the same to them."

"Em- right," Connor said. He released her hand as soon as humanly possible, but it didn't stop Abby from glaring.

Danny leaned close to his ear and murmured, "If you need a place to sleep tonight, my sofa's available..."

"The 'Merriest Holiday on Earth.' All I wanted. I should _sue_ you lot."

Danny grinned. "Come and meet the rest of the team..."

Eager for a change of subject, Connor followed their hosts to the other side of the room, where a tall, powerful fellow who looked like he'd be a match for Becker kept silent guard, seemingly watching the whole room at once. He had olive skin and dark, intense eyes, and he made no move to greet them.

"Major Tony Rivera," Danny said, "on loan from the US Marine Corps."

"Sir," said Rivera, nodding to them.

Connor frowned. "Did he just call me 'sir?'"

"Yes, sir."

"Becker never calls me sir." Connor shook the major's hand. "I like this one..."

"And last- where is he?" said Danny. "Over here."

If Connor thought the encounter with Sharon Clarke had been a surprise, he wasn't even half-prepared for what happened next. A slight young fellow in a laboratory coat faced one of the monitoring stations, running through a set of calculations, although he could be seen glancing at Sharon when he thought no one was looking. Connor remembered making adjustments to the ARC's anomaly detector by hand, distracted every time Abby came near. Those were the days. He almost expected to see his own face when the young man turned. What he got was quite a bit worse.

"Our scientific advisor," Lisa said, "Gideon Anderson..."

"Er- hello." The young man turned out to be English, with kind eyes and a neat fringe of beard. Very like a description Connor once heard of...

"Anderson?" he said. "As in Matt?"

"Is it possible...?" said Abby.

The young man thought they were mad. He shook Connor and Abby's hands perfunctorily and turned. "I don't know anyone named Matt- and I must finish running these tests. Excuse me..."

Danny shrugged as he scurried away. "No relation; I checked. It's a common name."

Connor sighed; of course, Danny didn't know Matt was from the future and had no reason to think what he suspected was possible. They themselves didn't know what century Matt was from. Gideon didn't have to be his father; he could have been a grandfather or more distant ancestor with some similar traits. Or the whole thing could have been coincidence.

"He _is_ from home, though," Abby said, sounding doubtful.

"A lot of our best operatives are from across the pond," Lisa said. "Between Danny's contacts and my efforts to reach out to former and rejected ARC employees..."

"America's using our leftovers?" Abby scoffed. "That's sort of funny."

"You pioneered this field. I have a hell of a lot of respect for you."

Connor blinked. "How d'you treat people you _don't_ respect?"

"I have them killed," Lisa said, in such perfect deadpan he had no idea if she was joking. She turned and walked away, so apparently it would remain a mystery...

When she was out of earshot, Abby cleared her throat. "This is all very nice, Danny, but what's the point? Why bring us here?"

"Yeah... that." Danny shuffled his feet, shrugged, and finally nodded toward the main display- or rather, toward a really large blip in one corner, somewhere out at sea. "Look, this isn't just a reunion. I need sort of a big favour..."

_Oh, so it's going to be one of_ those_ days_, Connor realised._ Of course it is..._

* * *

At the end of what felt like the longest shift in the history of work, Becker sought out Jess Parker. She was surprisingly hard to find, even with coms, but he finally found her working at a computer in one of the spare offices on the ARC's lower levels. Her screen was full of digital pictures and scans of documents, which she seemed to be cross-checking. When she saw him standing in the doorway, she blanked the screen. Becker thought that was weird.

"Shift's over," he said quietly. "Got a minute?"

Jess shut down the computer- whatever she was looking into, she really wasn't taking any chances- before turning, a little nervously. "Right, you wanted to talk. The fact is, I'm doing some work for Matt right now, and-"

"I didn't mean to snub you earlier," Becker said quickly. "I'm sorry."

Jess looked away; there was genuine hurt in her eyes that made Becker's stomach feel hollow. "I'm just a bit tired of being treated as an embarrassment, that's all."

"It's not like that," he said. "I really am sorry. A lot's been happening, and I don't know how to-"

"A lot always happens around here. You make time for someone, or you don't." Jess met his eyes; she was so beautiful. Her voice nearly cracked when she said, "Do you even want to be with me at all?"

_Say something. Say some damn thing before you ruin this, you idiot..._ But he didn't know what to say; he never had, when it came to things like this. Jess turned away.

"I suppose that's my answer."

"No, wait!" he said. "Wait, please. I didn't- damn. We really do need to talk. Say, over dinner?"

Jess saw that he meant it. She was just about to forgive him; it was depressing to Becker how well he knew that look already...

Something screeched- the anomaly detector. In moments, the lights were flashing and alarms were blaring everywhere... and Becker hadn't left for the day yet, so whatever had just ripped open the fabric of space and time was technically his responsibility.

"I've got to..."

Jess nodded. As he turned and hustled back to the control centre, he heard her quiet murmur: "Some other time, then."

Becker sighed. _Damn time-travellers, anyway. I've always trusted Matt, but about this... he's got to be wrong, doesn't he? Am I being selfish by hurting her, or by trying to keep her close?_

So far, he seemed to be getting the worst of both worlds: He wasn't quite with Jess, and she wasn't quite safe. And everyone was getting hurt, regardless. When Becker thought back on his personal life, he realised that was a fairly typical result...

_Not this time_, he swore to himself as he ran. _I'm going to make this right- no matter what._


	4. Act Three

**Primeval 6.5 **("The Fall of Angels")

by qjay

___DISCLAIMER: Primeval was created by Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines. It does not belong to me. This is not-for-profit fan fiction, and no infringement is intended._

* * *

**Act Three**

Jenny was just about getting used to the routine again- anomaly detector goes off, everyone scrambles and loads themselves up with advanced weaponry, piles into one of the ARC's trucks, and motors out to the latest crossroads of time and space. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine Stephen at the wheel, Connor and Abby bickering in the back seat, and Nick Cutter beside her. If she had to follow through the same routine, part of her thought it was better to be doing it with a group of near-strangers. Keeping herself rooted in the present kept the ghosts at bay.

Anyway, they had plenty of help: Filing out of the truck along with Jenny came Matt Anderson, Emily Merchant, Chris Newman, and... Becker. What _was_ his first name? Jenny couldn't remember if she'd ever known it. That was the sort of thing that was going to annoy her all day, assuming the dinosaurs didn't kill her first.

If the problem was dinosaurs. As they approached the block of flats the detector had indicated, Jenny realised the level of destruction in the surrounding neighbourhood didn't seem to indicate anything on the order of, say, a T-Rex. On the other hand, a subtler creature incursion wasn't always better, as she well knew...

Matt might have been thinking along the same line as he spoke into coms. "We're on-site, Jess. What have you got for us?"

"Not sure. The reports are very confused. I'm sorting them as fast as I can, but for now, be careful."

Jenny was about to make a remark- something about accurate but supremely unhelpful advice- when something crashed through an upper window of the building and smashed on the pavement at their feet. Jenny looked up and glimpsed- mostly glimpsed- a familiar, cackling goblin-face in the window, before it faded into the background. Or rather,_ camouflaging_ itself.

"Oh, I hate these things," she sighed.

Becker toed the wreckage- it had been a toaster, though alas, it would never toast again. "Lucky he didn't throw the telly. Big match today, Arsenal and United."

"Breaking windows and tossing things about," Newman growled. "What sort of creature does that?"

"Apparently, the kind that looks like something out of _Gremlins_." When the others frowned at her, Emily shrugged. "Filling in for Connor."

"Didn't realise that was an essential function..."

"Let's get this done," Matt said, and shouldered his EMD rifle before marching up to the infested building.

The building's front office was dark and deserted, not to mention pretty well smashed, the desk clawed to splinters and papers strewn all about. Having some experience with the nasty little goblins she'd seen in the window, Jenny wouldn't have blamed the occupants if they were halfway to Scotland by now.

She'd taken three steps inside before she realised her error- she should have said the building _appeared_ deserted, because you couldn't actually know until you saw those dark, clever eyes staring at you out of the wallpaper, and by then, it was probably too late.

"Watch out for-"

The words weren't even out of her mouth before something fell on Matt from above. He turned and fired, his reflexes sharper than anyone Jenny had ever known- even Stephen couldn't have hit the creature in the air on a millisecond's notice, as Matt did, knocking it across the room. The monkey-sized creature tried to struggle to its feet, and then collapsed.

Matt approached it carefully, took out his mobile phone, and snapped a couple of pictures. Then he spoke to coms again.

"This is what we're dealing with, Jess. What can you tell me about it?"

"Er... right," Jess said after a moment. "This one's in the database already. _Camouflage beast_ from an unidentified future era. No formal name as yet. Fast, dangerous. Last encountered just before the death of-"

Jenny looked down at her shoes. Jess couldn't see her, of course, but she might have realised she was treading uncomfortable ground, because she changed her word choice abruptly.

"-well, before our time."

"I need to know how many there are," Matt said.

"We only met one, but Patrick Quinn mentioned fighting a lot of them. They're probably social, possibly a pack hunter. If you've got one, you might have several."

"Well, that's just perfect," Matt sighed. He turned to her. "Jenny, round up the survivors and get them out of the building."

"That's far too dangerous for one person alone," snapped Newman, which endeared him to Jenny not at all. It was bad enough she had the damned job again, but to imply she couldn't _handle_ it...

"Fine, go with her," said Matt. Jenny tossed him an annoyed glance; she suspected he was only too happy to make that particular call. "Becker, Emily- with me."

As the core members of the team marched up the nearest staircase, Jenny glared at Newman. "For the record, I don't need your protection."

"I told you, you're _all_ amateurs to me."

Jenny started toward the staircase, then stopped. "While we're on the subject, never call me 'Claudia' again. I hate that name."

Newman grunted. "You hate the name, you hate the creatures- is there anything you_ like_, dearie?"

"About this job? Or you? Precious little." Jenny couldn't resist trying again. "Did you know Nick Cutter? Is that how you know me as Claudia?"

The mercenary shook his head as he started up the stairs. "Never met the man directly."

"What does 'directly' mean?"

He turned. "It means you should spend more time thinking about your husband, and less about dead scientists."

"What the _hell _gives you the right to-"

Before Jenny could stoke her annoyance up to a proper blaze of anger, before Newman could come up with something even stupider to say in response, she detected a flicker of motion on the wall above Newman's head. It leaped at him before she could raise her weapon, knocking him down the stairs. He tried to fight it off with a wicked-looking knife, but it was perched on his chest and cutting him to ribbons with razor-sharp claws and teeth. Jenny approached to within a metre and took aim...

"Don't shoot it!" Newman hissed. "At this range, you might kill me!"

_And the negative aspect would be...?_ Jenny thought. But she was a professional, and it was a fair point. She turned the EMD rifle around and swung it like a golf club, sending the chameleon beast flying. She remembered fighting airborne predators the same way, and smiled despite herself...

Once shaken from Newman, the beast leaped at her, but Jenny turned the rifle around and stunned it with a couple of bolts to the midsection. It dropped at her feet.

She turned to Newman, who watched her with a combination of admiration and annoyance. His wounds had looked worse at a glance than they actually were; the creature had merely ruined his shirt and taken off a layer of skin. Jenny offered him a hand, and he used it to find his feet.

"Glad I'm here with you," Jenny said. "It's far too dangerous for one person alone."

"Yeah, yeah. I'm sorry I called you Claudia." Newman sighed and steeled himself for the trip up the stairs, watching the walls more carefully this time. He stopped to append, "But not that I called you infuriating."

Which was frustrating, but- given how Jenny felt about _herself_ at the moment- probably fair enough.

* * *

Connor stood with Abby, Danny Quinn, and Lisa Barrett, watching the computerized display of Area 94's pseudo-hub: specifically, a wide blue field representing the ocean, studded with red dots representing... well, Connor wasn't sure exactly what, but they didn't look encouraging.

"What are we looking at?"

Danny shrugged. "Creature incursions, we think."

"In a matter of hours, we have reports of multiple shark attacks," Lisa said. "More than in the past twenty years combined. The survivors- I should say, the very few survivors- claim an improbable size for the attacker, bigger than any Great White on record."

Connor frowned. "How much bigger?"

"At least three times."

"There's only one shark that large in the fossil record," he said. "_Megalodon_."

Danny grinned. "See? I knew you two were right for this job."

"We haven't agreed to any job," said Abby.

"Someone's got to do it," said Lisa. "The damn thing's wreaking havoc off our coast. It's destroyed fishing boats, whale watchers... even ate a weather buoy."

Abby frowned at her. "Isn't that why you have a team? To handle it yourselves?"

Lisa looked away, perhaps slightly embarrassed to admit fallibility. "The team's still getting its feet wet. We haven't trained for a scenario like this."

"And you think _we_ have?" Abby said.

"We were on a submarine, that time," Connor reminded her.

"_Not_ helping."

Lisa sighed. "To track this thing ourselves, we'd need assistance from the Navy..."

"So get it," Connor said. "Last I heard, the US Navy was fairly large, yeah?"

Danny and Lisa shared an uncomfortable look- and the American agent's aura of supreme confidence slipped a bit further.

"The Navy... doesn't know we exist. At least, not the specifics of our mission. Look, it's a whole territorial thing between our Director and the Department of Defense..."

"I'd encourage them to settle it," Danny said, "but I don't actually want the American military involved with the anomalies. I didn't like it when _our_ military was involved."

"Fair point," said Abby, "but-"

"Lisa, give us a minute, will you?" As his second-in-command placed herself a few unhappy steps off to the side, out of hearing range, Danny drew Abby and Connor even further away. "Look, I'd really appreciate it if you'd help me with this..."

"Yeah, I've got that," Abby said. "What I don't understand is _why_."

"Long story. Look, I'm putting together a team here. They're as raw as we used to be. They need help." When he saw he wasn't quite winning over his old friends despite their sympathy, Danny changed tactics. "If you won't do it for me, do it for the world! If I can train them up responsibly- on the model of our team- that's better for everyone than if America goes off freelancing, right?"

Abby hissed. "That's not our call, Danny! We've signed the Official Secrets Act!"

"Lisa will work it out with Lester," Danny said, with a conciliatory gesture. "I'm not asking for top-secret technology; I'm asking you to join us on one mission and keep these kids alive!, Now, I know you can do _that_!"

"We're supposed to be on our honeymoon!" said Abby, running out of arguments.

"I'll make it up to you," Danny promised. "Soon as we're done: anywhere you want to go, anything you want to see- on the house. Courtesy of the US government."

Connor considered that for a moment. "Could I watch them make the new Star Wars film?"

"This is national security stuff, Connor. You can be_ in_ the new Star Wars film."

Connor looked at Abby; he had to be careful to hide the grin, lest he should reveal how impressed he was with that. Given his missteps with Sharon Clarke, he didn't really think she was in the mood to be amused. But even Abby seemed to be wavering.

"I don't know," she said after a long moment. "What do you think?"

Connor shrugged. "I think, if Megalodon ate a weather buoy, we can track it."

Danny grinned. He knew he had them in the palm of his hand. Abby's expression was the mirror image of that- she also knew he'd outmanoeuvred them, but she still didn't see the whole picture, and it bothered her.

That was one of the nice things about Abby. They were about to do battle with a shark large enough to swallow them whole, and it didn't faze her a bit. She probably_ liked_ the part about seeing the shark up-close. She just didn't like not understanding why. As a scientist, Connor sympathised. As a geek who'd grown up practising Han Solo's lines in his bedroom mirror, he didn't see how it mattered...

* * *

But, in point of fact, it did matter. Connor would have been the first to admit Abby's instincts were often better than his own, and on the other side of a wall across the room from Danny and his guests sat a prime example.

Opposite that wall was the Director's Office of Area 94, where sat Lester's opposite number, the high-level bureaucrat Lisa and Danny jokingly called "The American." Right now, the American was watching them through one-way glass set into the wall, drumming his fingers on his polished desk as he considered what this visit might mean.

A man stood at attention before him- a man who'd tactfully removed himself from the other room as soon as the others' backs were turned, the very man to whom Connor had taken such a liking: the former Marine officer, Major Rivera. He awaited the Director's decision placidly, without expression, used to enduring the whims of his superiors.

The American glanced up at him, studied his chiselled features. "You're certain they didn't recognise you?"

"No, sir. Only Matt Anderson saw my face in the Pleistocene; I'm sure of that."

"All right," said the American. He hissed out a long breath, too annoyed to be a sigh. "What do you make of them, then?"

"They're... inquisitive, sir."

"Yes. Old friends of Danny Quinn. Very coincidental."

"If I may, sir..." Rivera managed to look apologetic- though not too much so- for correcting his superior. "I told you Quinn would be a problem when he was recruited."

The Director shook his head. "Quinn isn't the problem, it's Lisa Barrett. We needed someone above suspicion to deflect DoD's interest in this place. Of course she brought in a lot of loyal idiots like herself. As long as she remains in the dark, so will Quinn. And we've certainly got leverage to use, in case he doesn't.

"But back to the present... don't you find it a little too pat? Southfield goes dark, and not even two months later, Connor Temple and Abby Maitland show up on our doorstep? Someone is guiding them here... pushing them in our direction..."

"Newman?" said Major Rivera, frowning.

The American waved off his concern. "Let me worry about Newman. This is something... I don't know. What shall we do with them? That's the question."

Rivera shrugged. "They're off the grid now, sir. Easy enough to arrange an accident."

The American listened to the sound of his own fingers, drumming on the desktop. Then he shrugged. "See what you can come up with. But Rivera... don't do it right away. Watch them for a while, first. By all means, let them help their friend. You never know what we might learn."

Rivera came to attention. "Yes, sir. It will be handled quietly."

"Good," said the American. He glared at Connor and Abby through the glass, felt a flash of anger as he always did at the clueless fools of the ARC, who had no idea the potential they'd been squandering for years. "There's no one more dangerous than Temple... and these are, after all, the people who killed Liz Evans. I'd be personally grateful if they ended this little outing on the bottom of the ocean."

The major looked through the glass himself, and grinned. "I think I can guarantee that, sir..."

* * *

James Lester stood in the control centre of the ARC along with Jess, waiting for his patched-together team of irregulars to return home. It amused him to recall the fight he'd had with Matt Anderson on the day he brought in Chris Newman: the focus of their argument, which had raged long into the night and created a semi-permanent rift between them, had been on Lester's plan to shift Emily to a support capacity, send her off for extended training while he shaped a more rough-and-ready team able to stand up to Southfield. Now that disagreement seemed silly; between unscheduled trips to the past and spur-of-the-moment honeymoons, they'd yet to have the whole team in one place since Newman arrived, and Emily hadn't even been told of his intentions.

At this point, Lester decided, it wasn't worth it to revisit the argument. Things were spiralling out of control much more quickly than intended, and having an extra hand around whom he trusted would be worth a bit of temporary overcrowding.

Trust was a difficult issue for Lester these days, not that he'd ever been naïve. But with Newman and Matt's future double behaving about equally suspiciously, and the rest of the team keeping secrets borne of their strong reactions to those two, Lester wasn't certain he could trust even allies as loyal as Becker or as guileless as Connor Temple not to have an agenda.

It didn't help that circumstances didn't permit Lester to be perfectly forthcoming himself. Case in point: Jennifer Lewis-Miller, who finally stumbled into the control centre with the rest of the weary field team and noticed his presence immediately. Lester knew what she expected of him; this would have to be handled delicately...

Fortunately, Matt spoke first, dictating a safer subject. "There you are, Lester: Twelve camouflage beasts, sent back through one locked anomaly. Any other little tasks you'd like performed today?"

"Yes; one of my team leaders persistently and erroneously believes himself to be clever. I'd be pleased if you could break him of that notion..."

Matt grunted; he was less amused by sarcastic jabs these days. A pity; Lester thought that was a good one. Meanwhile, Becker approached Jess and leaned over the Hub.

"All finished. Now, how about that dinner?"

Jess made a face. "Wish I could, but I need a word with Matt..."

Matt's expression might have been even less thrilled. He didn't want to get in the middle of whatever personal matter was dividing those two. Lester didn't blame him; just hearing about it second-hand was quite annoying enough.

"It can wait until tomorrow," Matt said.

"Actually, it can't." Jess pushed back her chair and walked past Lester on her way around the Hub; he thought she _hurried_ past him, as though she didn't want to draw his attention.

_Lovely. Now it's Jess. I suppose when even _she's_ capable of deception, the whole world might as well be a James Bond film... or Invasion of the Body Snatchers... or a place where I think like Connor..._

"Will you come with me?" Jess said. "I left the files I need on the other computer."

"Er- sure," said Matt, who must have been perfectly aware, as Lester was, that computers in the ARC were networked, their data available to the team coordinator from any terminal.

_At least she's a_ bad_ liar. That's something,_ Lester thought, as Matt and Jess left the room.

Becker did everything he could not to seem annoyed by this. "Think I'll head down to the infirmary. One of those damned things bit me."

As he started to leave, Emily stopped him with a hand on his elbow. "She'll come around. It's been a long day."

"Too many long days around here..."

When Becker was halfway to the door, Chris Newman stirred; someone might have cut paper dolls out of his shirt, and the skin beneath it had seen better days, as well.

"I'll walk with you."

"Walking's fine," Becker said. "Talk, and we'll have a problem..."

"Does that mean you don't want me to pass her a note in Maths class?"

That drew a glare, but Becker was too annoyed with the world in general to take it out on Newman specifically. The two of them left together; so far as Lester could see, that meant no more delaying his own errand.

"I have the information I promised," he told Jenny. "Join me in my office?"

"Yes, thank you."

Together with Jenny, Lester joined the heavy traffic moving into the corridor. On the way, he nodded to Emily, whose apparent lack of ulterior motive made Lester feel even worse about his personnel decisions. He supposed she wasn't the first ARC operative he'd misjudged; Nick Cutter held that distinction, followed by... well, essentially anyone Cutter ever recruited. At least this time, it couldn't be helped.

A moment later, in his officer, Lester grabbed a thick manilla folder off his desk and handed it to Jenny. "As promised, everything I've been able to gather about Southfield's Claudia Brown project- minus the bits above our clearance level."

Jenny flipped through the folder and frowned at line after line of blacked-out text. "That appears to be most of it."

"Yes, and the rest is rather too technical to decipher. Perhaps Connor can help you when he returns."

Jenny sighed unhappily. "How long do you think it would take him?"

"One never knows, with Connor."

He thought he kept his tone sufficiently light, but Jenny was no fool. She replaced the folder on his desk and peered at Lester. "Are you trying to keep me here even longer?"

Lester shrugged. "You can hardly blame me. You're the first civilised company I've had in..."

"James," she interrupted, a simple plea for forthrightness.

Lester looked away. "I prefer to have you in the ARC at present, yes."

"Why? What possible reason could you have for-" Jenny trailed off, the breath going out of her as the obvious conclusion fell into place. "James, is my life in danger?"

"Yes," Lester admitted, "possibly."

"But I don't understand. Why? From whom?"

Lester stepped around his desk and sat down in his chair, the better to cast his baleful glare across Jenny, the office, and the ARC generally. Perhaps their recent problems weren't due to dishonesty at all, he thought. The trouble was that some questions were so easy to answer, yet so hard to explain...

* * *

Matt allowed Jess to lead him halfway across the ARC and into the menagerie observation room before turning on her. He'd set her on her present mission, and even he was getting annoyed with the cloak-and-dagger.

"Jess, come on..."

"We can talk freely in here," she said. "Yes?"

Matt pointed out the window, where a familiar flying lizard had taken an interest in their movements. "Unless you're afraid of Rex eavesdropping, yeah..."

Jess started to smile at that- then, on second thought, she turned and closed the window. Matt wanted to burst out laughing.

"Jess, what are you doing?"

"I'm doing what you asked," Jess said. "I looked into Newman. His records are all faked. There are no pictures of him as a child, no old friends, no anything genuine. Just an electronic shadow."

Matt felt his temper rise, but tried to restrain his excitement. "If he was MI6, there are a lot of reasons he could have a false identity. Can you hack through it?"

"I have done, but there's not much there." Jess shrugged. "All I can verify is a date of birth and a mother's maiden name. The name is Sophia Ross. Recognise it?"

Matt shrugged. "Should I?"

"Nick Cutter would. It was his mother's maiden name, too."

Matt took a deep breath, exhaled. Paced a small circle. Came back to Jess, who was just waiting for him to wrap his mind around that.

"You're saying Newman is Cutter's brother? How is that possible without us knowing?"

"It's not, and that's not what I'm saying." Jess handed him a tablet with the records already called up for his inspection. "Their birth dates are four months apart. The same woman _couldn't_ have given birth to both of them, and neither is adopted. Matt... I don't think they can both exist in the same world."

Matt studied the tablet for a long moment, but none of the letters and numbers on it changed, and Jess certainly knew better than he if the records it displayed were authentic. He handed it back to Jess.

"All right," he said. "Keep digging. Keep this between us for now."

"I will, but I don't understand," Jess said. "If Newman is some sort of... anomaly, for lack of a better word, some remnant of another timeline... who brought him here? Why do they need someone connected to Cutter? What's their goal?"

Matt thought about it. "I can't answer the first two questions, but as to the last: I was brought here as an anomaly, too. My goal was pretty simple. Change the world."

"Into what?"

That was, in fact, the obvious question. As Matt had no response, he clasped Jess on the shoulder and walked away. Whatever the answer might be, he felt certain they were running out of time to find it...


	5. Act Four

**Primeval 6.5 **("The Fall of Angels")

by qjay

___DISCLAIMER: Primeval was created by Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines. It does not belong to me. This is not-for-profit fan fiction, and no infringement is intended._

* * *

**Act Four**

The sun was shining and the ocean breeze lovely as Connor and Abby approached a pier a few miles from the theme park. Two boats were tied to the pier, small craft suitable for fishing charters, but probably not for creature-hunting. The larger of the two was a battered working boat called the _Monterey_; Danny and Lisa stood in front of it, quibbling over some small point of preparedness. The smaller boat, the _Pacifica_, was newer and brightly-painted. Sharon Clarke and Major Rivera were loading supplies onto this one.

And Gideon Anderson. Connor shook his head, remembering his awkward telephone conversation with Matt before they left for the pier:

_"Hello, Matt? Connor. Sorry, silly question, but... your mother wasn't by any chance American?"_

_"Connor, what the-" Matt's voice trailed off, and Connor heard several EMD shots, then a loud chorus of breaking glass. "Look, I'm a little busy right now!"_

_"I can tell, but it's really important. She wasn't American? No Americans on her side of the family? Anywhere? Are you sure?"_

_Matt didn't answer for a long moment. Connor did hear a snippet of what sounded like Becker's voice saying '-tell him to get the bloody hell off the line, and-" and then another snippet of "-get this damned thing off my arm before it-" But Connor assumed that was simply business as usual. The team would handle it. Probably._

_Finally, Matt's exasperated voice again: "My mother was Irish, Connor! Why do you think I talk like this? And why are you calling in the middle of a mission to discuss genealogy?"_

_"Nothing," Connor said quickly. "It's nothing. I'll handle it. It's probably- it's definitely nothing. Good luck with the, um-"_

_"Chameleon beasts," Matt supplied._

_"Oh," Connor said. "Not sorry to miss_ that_. I hate those things..."_

At that point, Matt subjected him to a string of profanity and then hung up on him. Connor supposed he'd have done no less, though he did feel just a bit annoyed when he remembered he was double-checking these details for Matt's own good- not to mention that of the Universe.

Even Abby didn't fully understand. She was still upbraiding him as they approached the boats: "Really, Connor, what did you expect? So we met Matt's father; so what?"

"So, everything!" Connor said. "We met him and he didn't have a son- and he seemed very interested in a woman who isn't Matt's mother!"

"Yeah, but not seriously. _You_ seemed as interested as he did. Do you really want to go there?"

"No, no. Not getting side-tracked." Connor waved his arms elaborately. "We met him. And now we've altered his destiny, just by interacting with him! Everything he's done since New Dawn didn't destroy civilisation is a new destiny! It might be up to us to make sure Matt gets born!"

Abby rolled her eyes. "More time-travel nonsense. Look, we know Matt gets born, we've met him! If anything had happened differently, _we'd_ forget him too, right? Right?"

"Maybe..." Connor sighed. He remembered Professor Cutter using that slightly cynical '_maybe_' on occasion. Perhaps it happened to everyone who dealt in time. "The time-shift might not occur until the change becomes inevitable, until we pass some temporal point of no return.

"Look at it this way," he said. "Suppose the world ends due to one of Helen's plots. And twenty years from now, our child is sent back in time to set things right..."

"Twenty years?" Abby's eyebrows jumped. "When were you planning on having this child?"

"Again, sidetracked. The point is, suppose he-"

"And why do you assume it's a he?"

"_She_, then! Whatever!"

"Well, if it's a girl, what's her name?"

Connor took a deep breath, counted ten, and tried again. "Abby, she's entirely hypothetical. It doesn't matter what her name is."

Abby rolled her eyes. "You say that, but sooner or later she'll need a name and if I leave it you, she'll be named for Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I can't take the chance. Call her Chloe."

"What? That's a terrible name! How is that better than- no! Mustn't... get... _sidetracked_!" Connor sighed. "Fine. Suppose _Chloe_ saves the world by stopping Helen before she started- which would be wonderful! Just like Matt saving the world from New Dawn was wonderful! But there's a chance she could prevent her own birth in the process, which is... not so wonderful for the timeline..."

Abby blinked at him. "How would she prevent her birth?"

"Lots of ways!" Connor shrugged. "Depending on the timing, we could never join the ARC... we could get off on the wrong foot and never become friends... you could marry Stephen..."

Abby stared at him for a long moment. "Connor, please tell me you don't devote a lot of time to thinking up alternate Universes where I marry men I used to fancy."

"I don't devote _time_ to it. They just occur to me."

"Well, stop it!" Abby took both his hands and made him halt and look at her. "I mean it, stop. You want to know why I've been so nice to you? It's because I want you to know I'm really happy, and I wouldn't change a thing between us. And you know what? _Nobody_ could change a thing. Even if our theoretical time-travelling children change history so that talking apes rule the planet. _This_ is something you don't have to worry about."

Connor felt himself blushing. He knew Abby was serious about getting through to him when she made a deliberate sci-fi reference. "That's lovely, but it's not how time works. Point I'm trying to make, with really no success, is: someone has to make sure the person who saves the world gets born, no matter what, and that someone might be _us_."

Abby grinned. "I've heard a lot of lines, but: 'We have to get married so our daughter can save the world'- that's bold. You should have tried that sooner."

"I meant Matt!" Connor was just about to take another run at explaining the concept when he saw the sparkle in her eye. "Are you making fun of me?"

"Yeah, I am." Abby softened. "I just want you to put all this time stuff aside for a while. Matt's past will be fine. Worry about our present."

"Believe me, I'm worried about that, too." Connor sighed; maybe it was just the stress of all those other worries. Maybe he was going out of his way to find problems that could be solved. He squeezed Abby's hand- which only made him notice another problem. He pointed to her ring. "Y'know, if you do want to keep this quiet for another month, you'll have to stop wearing that."

Abby pulled her hand away. "No, I won't. I nearly lost it once. I'm not taking it off again. The team already knows, so..."

"If that's how you feel, we can drop the ceremony, as far as I'm concerned."

In his whole, long search for the right thing to say to Abby, her expression indicated that might have been the wrongest he'd ever been. "Connor! It's our _wedding_!"

"Yeah, but we're married. We're on our honeymoon. Who needs a fuss?"

She started walking again. "We were married in a _basement_. I'm sure our friends would like to see a proper ceremony. And our families!"

Connor shrugged as he kept up. "I don't see your brother Jack getting sentimental..."

"If he won't, I will. And what about your family? I'm sure your mum will want to see it!"

Connor looked away. "Uh- yeah, sure. I mean... yeah. Why not?"

Now _he_ started walking really fast, outpacing her- but not by enough. Abby caught him from behind and made him turn. "What now? Why wouldn't she?"

"Well... you know. About my mum. And how she... adores you and... doesn't at all think your old hairstyle made you look like a Spice Girl..."

"A _Spice Girl_?" Abby stared at him. "Which one?"

"Does it matter?"

Abby looked like she wanted to argue further; unfortunately, the pier was only so long, and they'd arrived at the _Monterey_. Connor gave an innocent shrug.

"Oh, we are so not done with this!" she snapped, and pushed past him to board.

Connor approached the boat more slowly, thinking through the eccentricities of time. When he got there, Lisa had already gone aboard and his former team leader was waiting.

"Not your day?" Danny asked, glancing in the direction Abby had gone.

"Getting back to normal. I'm actually relieved."

Danny looked all around for Lisa, then lowered his voice. "Connor, are you sure you can track this shark using the signal from the weather buoy?"

"Yeah, absolutely." Connor shrugged. "With top-of-the-line satellite technology at my disposal? Too easy."

"About that." Danny winced. "Lisa couldn't get clearance to show you the high-tech stuff. What can you do with an old weather radio and some rusty tools?"

Connor started to laugh. Then he realised his old friend was serious. Then he sighed. "I guess I'd better find out..."

As he turned toward the boat, someone ran straight into him from the other direction; Connor was knocked to the dock, and nearly into the water, by a walking pile of life jackets. By the time he got his senses together, Gideon Anderson was already picking up the scattered pile, muttering profuse apologies.

"Sorry, sorry. Fieldwork is... well, it's not my area. Sorry..."

Connor picked himself up, recovered several of the jackets, and even helped Gideon fish a straggler out of the water. Then he saw what had distracted the young analyst: Sharon Clarke, soaking in the sun in a spare moment on the deck of the _Pacifica_.

Despite himself, Connor smiled. "Admiring her hull?"

"What? Yes. I mean- no! No. The- the boat, yes. Anything else, no."

"Secret's safe with me, mate." Connor leaned closer and said in a conspiratorial whisper, "Though, just between us, I think you can do better."

Gideon Anderson, whatever else he was, was not a fool. He laughed aloud at the suggestion.

"No, I mean it! Ex-CIA operative... gives me the creeps. Scratch the surface, and what is she?"

"A decorated army veteran with a degree in evolutionary biology."

"Really?" Connor craned his neck to study the American agent. "Well, that's... as may be. Point is, I think what you need is a nice girl from home. Or some place near home. Like Ireland. Ireland's lovely. Do you ever think of going to Ireland?"

"I've got work to do," said Gideon. "But feel free to keep talking nonsense after I've gone..."

He turned and walked in the other direction, a slight scarecrow buried in life jackets. Connor shook his head. Danny sidled over next to him and cleared his throat.

"You're not very subtle," Danny said. "Do me a favour, stop worrying about Gideon and Sharon. If only because I don't want to see Abby tie you to an anchor and toss you overboard."

Connor laughed. "Yeah... I should. I mean, he's not gonna get anywhere. Look at him."

"Right," said Danny. "An awkward little geek, hanging around a beautiful blonde, hoping she'll take notice of him... who ever heard of that working?"

"Dunno," said Connor. "When you put it that way, it's sort of sad."

"Pathetic, really."

Connor stared at Danny, who seemed to be trying to say something, but it went over his head. Finally he shrugged and boarded the ship, and Danny seemed to find that funny. Connor wondered what he was missing.

He didn't have long to wonder. He'd no sooner boarded than Lisa Barrett came running out of the cabin. "Quinn! Come on, we've got to go! There's been another attack."

Danny hopped over the gunwale and landed in the boat. He cast off the lines connecting them to the pier, and moments later, the _Monterey_ was off shark-hunting, its sister ship following close behind.

It was, Connor reflected, a very bad time to remember how easily he got seasick...

* * *

Becker kept trying to apply disinfectant to the wounds on his arm, but it would have been easier without Newman sitting in the corner of the room, smirking. Considering his whole chest was wrapped in bandages from a much larger wound, Becker thought he had a lot of nerve remaining smug.

The disinfectant stung, and he slapped the tube down on the counter, provoking a laugh from Newman.

Becker glared at him. "What's put you in a good mood?"

"Hard to say. What's put you in a worse one than usual?"

Becker turned and rolled up his sleeve. "I'm not doing this with you. Not today."

"What's wrong with today?" Newman stood and pulled his shirt over the bandages. "Wouldn't have anything to do with Miss Parker's sudden preoccupation?"

Becker crossed the room in two steps and grabbed him by the collar. "You're new here, mate, so you get one chance. You don't know a thing about Jess or me. Don't talk about us."

"In your case, I don't give a damn," Newman said, pulling away. "But that girl's the only one here who's treated me like a person, so for her sake, I'll give you some free advice: You're an idiot. Stop that."

"Noted," Becker said. "Mutual. Now, shut it."

"Fine," said Newman, spreading his hands. "Not my concern."

He got as far as the door, and stopped. "You know, you're right about me. All of you are right. I don't know anything about people. All I've seen is how they destroy each other, which never takes much. Sometimes, just a well-meant lie."

Shaking his head, he walked out the door and closed it quietly behind him. He wasn't even smirking. Becker remained in place for what felt like some time, thinking: _So he's right, so what? Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Doesn't mean I owe him anything, certainly not an apology._

_Not even if this works..._

* * *

The two halves of the ship had broken apart- shattered like a child's plastic toy- and seemed to be racing each other to the bottom of the ocean in what was rapidly becoming a swirling vortex reminiscent of a certain unanticipated theme park ride. The sheer ferocity it must have taken to shred a modern vessel so efficiently was hard to fathom; the attack must have been awful for those unfortunate enough to experience it, not that any sign of survivors was in evidence.

Dreadful as all that was to contemplate, it wasn't the first thing that occurred to Abby when the _Monterey_ came upon the scene of the latest attack. Rather, her instinct was to look at the oil, the slick black stain spreading in all directions from what had once been a fuel tanker, and shake her head in dismay.

"This is an environmental _disaster_," she murmured, not really to anyone. "This will poison a whole ecosystem for years to come..."

"Told you it had to be stopped," said Danny, equally sombre. "Connor, any luck tracking it?"

Abby's new husband looked up from the deck, where he was spread out with a box of tools and what looked like an old weather radio.

"Another minute, please. Working with stone knives and bearskins." Connor paused. "Nobody gets the reference? _The City on the Edge of Forever_? Classic Star Trek? Edith Keeler? Really, no one?"

Danny turned to Abby. "You're sure that proposal was a good idea?"

Abby thought about it and shrugged. "On balance, yeah..."

As the _Pacifica_ motored up alongside them and cut its engines, Lisa again stepped out of the cabin. She joined them at the gunwale and hovered over Connor's shoulder.

"Sorry I couldn't patch you into the satellite. Our director's a son of a bitch sometimes."

Connor winked at Abby. "Really? We never have that problem with ours..."

"We do have some day-old gadgets that might interest you." With her guests' attention now on her, Lisa strode over to the port side, where a series of metal drums were lashed to the deck. "Improvised depth charges rigged with anomaly-locking devices. If we can find the anomaly and drop these into it, it'll close."

"Finding the _anomaly'_s no problem," Connor said. "We can do that with the radio."

Abby smiled. "Just like old times."

"We've also got these." Lisa held up a harpoon gun with a strangely blunt tip and touched it to the hull, producing a spark. "Instead of a harpoon, an attached EMD device. Should be harmless to a creature Megalodon's size, but we can use them to herd it along."

"I like that," said Abby, who'd been expecting more things that went _boom!_ from the Americans. Her opinion of Lisa rose a couple of notches.

Connor cleared his throat. "So, is every invention you've got one of our devices tied to a bit of rubbish?"

"Yes, precisely!" called Gideon, from the other boat. "That's my method, you might say. Do you like it?"

"Eh," said Connor with a shrug. "I've seen worse..."

Of course, by saying so, he was really complimenting himself and the rest of the technical department at the ARC. Abby was tempted to smack the back of his head while he was watching Lisa, but the American's presentation continued and the opportunity passed...

Lisa crossed to the starboard side, which also held half a dozen metal drums. "These over here are rigged with EMD grenades. Strong stuff, so don't, um, bang on them or... touch them or... raise your voice too loud..."

Abby sighed; that was more what she expected. She noted, however, that Connor seemed even more disappointed than she did, when she would have expected him to find such a thing cool.

"EMD... grenades?" He frowned. "Met a man with EMD grenades the other day. We didn't get along..."

Lisa, perhaps, thought he was just being over-cautious. "They're a necessity for this job. If we can position the shark over the anomaly and detonate one of these, we can stun it. It sinks into the anomaly, back to its own time, and then we lock it."

Danny said, "We need one boat to find the anomaly, while the other locates the shark and lures it into position."

"Oh, is that all?" Abby said.

Danny shrugged. "Like you said... old times."

"Right," Connor hauled himself to his feet and looked over the assortment of gadgets. "So, who gets the easy job and who gets to be shark bait? Or is that a foolish question?"

Abby sighed. Not so much_ foolish _as _easily answered_, she feared.

Danny slapped Connor on the back. "I'll worry about the shark. You just concentrate on tracking it."

A deep voice- Major Rivera- called from the other boat, "I don't think that'll be a problem, sir!"

Abby followed Rivera's line of sight to a point off _Pacifica's_ bow. A fin- a large fin- actually, a _huge_ fin had just broken the surface of the water, and was headed their way, fast.

"Someone start the engine," Gideon murmured. "Start the engine right now, please."

"I, um, think that's your job," said Sharon.

"Oh... so it is."

Gideon dove into the_ Pacifica's_ cabin. A moment later, the _Monterey's_ escort roared to life and pulled away- leaving, unfortunately, nothing but empty sea between Abby and Connor and Megalodon.

"Well, that was clever," Connor said. "Now it's chasing us..."

"Probably best if it doesn't catch us," said Danny.

"On it!" said Lisa. She crossed the deck in three long strides and gunned the _Monterey's_ own engine. The boat lurched forward, nearly jolting Abby off her feet and tossing Connor against the gunwale, as the huge fin barely missed cutting them in half. It changed course after them and loomed in close pursuit.

"Oh, right," said Connor. "_This_ is why I hated the old times..."

Danny grabbed one of the harpoon guns and tossed the other to Abby. She could see the shark behind them, its black eyes and impossibly large maw just beneath the surface. Each of its teeth must have been bigger than Abby's hand... and it possessed no small number of them.

One of the quirky things about working for the ARC: the members of the main team didn't have the luxury of being specialists. Between them, Abby and Matt were pretty much expected to cover the whole spectrum of zoological knowledge, and she'd ranged far afield from her original focus on reptiles over the years. Still, she wasn't a marine biologist, and didn't possess much detailed knowledge about sharks.

_Then again_, she thought as those cold eyes stared back at her, _some things don't need a great deal of explanation..._

* * *

Back on the_ Pacifica,_ Gideon Anderson was trying to track down the anomaly by its effect on radio signals- a more difficult job than it appeared, when the anomaly's effects were muted by several cubic metres of water. Still, he was making good progress, when he wasn't worried about Ireland.

He hadn't revealed as much to Connor Temple, who seemed a little mad, but Gideon _had _thought about going to Ireland. More than a year ago, before Convergence had made anomalies famous the world over, he'd been offered a post at a university there, and had been on the verge of accepting. When he'd first met Lisa Barrett, he'd laughed at her. Then Convergence came, and nothing was the same any longer. But he'd always sort of feared joining up was a mistake- he wasn't an adventurer, a life of quiet study suited him fine, and he felt a bit out of place with Danny Quinn's team. But then, he felt a bit out of place everywhere. Suppose Ireland was his chance, and he'd completely missed it?

Fortunately, he didn't have long to brood on such questions: Sharon Clarke and Major Rivera came tearing into the cabin in mid-argument.

"I don't know what you intend to do!" the major was saying. He pointed out the porthole, where the _Monterey _was fleeing Megalodon. "They're already gone! Just stick to the plan!"

"The plan's no good!" Sharon insisted. "The shark caught us unprepared; they don't have enough time! We've got to do _something_ to help them!"

"What we have to do is find the anomaly. Those are our orders." Major Rivera seemed pleased to repeat those orders; at least, until he saw Gideon listening in, and turned on him. "Well, _move it,_ Anderson! You're not paid to stand around!"

Sharon looked to Gideon for help. Actually, that needed capitalisation: She looked To Him. For Help. And Gideon would have been more than pleased to do anything she asked. The only trouble was, he agreed with the major. His was a scientific mind that believed in staying on-mission. And, not to put too fine a point on it, he didn't much like the idea of dying in a foolish cause.

Danny knew what he was doing. Temple was supposedly brilliant. Gideon shook his head and turned back to the radio, silently cursing himself.

He was fairly sure he'd missed his chance, yet again...

* * *

Connor watched as Danny fired his harpoon at the pursuing Megalodon: It sparked and sputtered when it hit the water, but didn't even slow the giant shark.

He held onto the railing for dear life. "We've got to keep our distance! Megalodon was known to ram and immobilise its prey, and its teeth are tougher than a Great White's! It can probably bite right through this hull!"

"Again, _not_ helping," said Abby, who fired her own harpoon weapon and missed completely.

"All right. Nice try. Um... couldn't aim a bit better next time, could you?"

Abby glared at him. "Well, _I_ can't, but I'm just a Spice Girl. Perhaps we should call your mother!"

"Look, I'm sure that was meant as a compliment!"

Danny reloaded, fired, and overshot the shark by a metre. It was getting too close. He turned back toward the cabin. "Lisa, open her up! These ships don't look like much, but their guts are military-grade. We should be able to outrun it, unless we have-"

Something in the cabin went _bang_, then _crash_, and then the _Monterey_ started belching smoke from every orifice. Connor took a wild guess the drowned-out words had been –_engine trouble._

Lisa evacuated the cabin, coughing and choking on smoke. "I don't know what happened! I checked the engine this morning! Everything was fine, and then it just _gave out_ at the worst possible moment!"

"I'm sure it's possible for the moment to be worse," Connor murmured, the same sort of faint praise that led him to call his mother's summation of Abby a compliment. Then he saw Megalodon wheel around and angle straight for the port side of the boat, propelling itself forward with great thrusts of its tail, teeth gleaming in the Pacific sun as it prepared to snap the_ Monterey_ in half.

"Well," he sighed, looking around at the others, "maybe not..."


	6. Act Five

**Primeval 6.5 **("The Fall of Angels")

by qjay

___DISCLAIMER: Primeval was created by Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines. It does not belong to me. This is not-for-profit fan fiction, and no infringement is intended._

* * *

**Act Five**

With Megalodon only a few metres off the _Monterey's _stern, Danny Quinn heaved one of the metal drums over his head- one of ones rigged with EMD grenades, supposedly really unstable- and hurled it into the water. Abby covered her eyes, expecting at any moment a blinding flash that would leave them helpless. But the drum didn't detonate until it struck the great shark squarely on the nose.

The flash came then, and Abby hoped that might be the end of it. But if the drums weren't quite as unstable as advertised, nor were they quite as potent. Megalodon weathered the massive electric shock, but lurched away from the boat at the last moment, disoriented.

Even so, the _Monterey_ was nearly swamped, and her crew soaked by what felt like a tidal wave. Abby hung on for dear life, and Connor was knocked to the deck, striking his head. It seemed to be a glancing blow, for he popped back up almost immediately with blood trickling down his scalp.

"Ow..." he murmured, and coughed out salt water while he rubbed at the spot.

Abby hurried toward him, but Danny got between them and thumped Connor on the back.

"Forget the radio. Get the damned engine working. It'll soon be back."

"Even if the engine works, we'll be hobbled," Abby said as her husband descended down into the smoke-filled engine compartment. "We won't be leading it anywhere. We need to call for help."

"Yeah." Danny hissed. "About that..."

"We don't have a transmitter," Lisa explained, "only a homing beacon. I had to pull rank and hurl twenty minutes' worth of obscenities at Rivera just to get that. The mission's top secret; he wasn't willing to risk anyone listening to what we sent."

"Really?" Abby groaned. "Well, wasn't that clever of him?"

Connor poked his head up from below. "You know, any time you people want to stop being inept and go back to being smug but reliable, that'd be lovely..."

He went back to work before Lisa could take offence, but if she had, Abby would have been happy to take up the argument. She still hadn't figured out what game everyone was playing here: Lisa, who seemed earnest enough but certainly had her own priorities. Major Rivera, who seemed like just another military idiot. And Danny Quinn, who was his old self, yet oddly distant at the same time.

If she accomplished one thing before she died out here, Abby wanted to determine what was going on. Though, come to that, she strongly preferred not to die at all...

* * *

In the _Monterey's _sister ship, Gideon Anderson tried for at least the fifth time to locate a submerged anomaly via radio interference, while blocking out a rapidly escalating disagreement between his team-mates.

"Now their beacon's gone dark!" Sharon Clarke was saying. "If anything happened to them because-."

"Because we kept to the plan without panicking?" Major Rivera said. "It's what we do in this business, Ms. Clarke. You might try it sometime."

"I'm not panicking; I'm saying Danny wouldn't abandon us!"

Rivera turned on her. "That's because _Danny_ is a dangerous freelancer. Anyway, what do you want to do? They're out of range."

"If we find the shark, we find them," said Sharon. "Temple said he could track it."

"You know, I've heard a lot about the great Connor Temple, but I've yet to see him do anything useful. He's a lot like his mentor; hell, he's a lot like this team Danny put together. From what I can see, the only thing Quinn chose well was... eye candy."

Sharon took a step forward; Major Rivera winked at her, which didn't seem a smart course of action if he wanted to keep breathing. Or if he wanted to avoid hopelessly derailing the...

"You're wrong," Gideon said, more loudly than intended. With the major glaring at him, he modulated his voice to its usual quiet precision and continued, "You're wrong about us. You're wrong about Connor Temple. He's a bit strange, but his work is genius. And you're wrong to want the mission to fail."

Rivera flinched- anger blazed behind his eyes, but he concealed it. "I don't want the mission to fail."

"Yes, actually you do, it's rather obvious. I assume it's because you don't like seeing your military shown up by foreign civilians, but your reasons are your own. Your actions, however, are perfectly clear: You denied them a transmitter. Your men would have been responsible for the final check of their equipment. And now you're delaying in the hopes we'll fail to save them. But we won't, because we have this."

Gideon turned around the weather radio and showed it to them. Sharon understood what he meant.

"The buoy signal. You think you can succeed where Temple failed?"

"He didn't fail; he lacked access. Fortunately, environmental impact studies are what I do, and I'm familiar with the satellite data. I have all everything we need-" Gideon tapped his forehead. "Up here."

"That's classified information!" Rivera said. When the others glared at him, he seemed to realize he was on shaky ground, and changed his approach. "Look. Maybe I did get territorial, but it wasn't deliberate. Quinn's my superior, and I respect the chain of command. So... can you really hack it?"

Gideon nodded. Sharon watched the major for another long moment, then relaxed.

"Look, I'm military, too. I get it. Help us save Danny and the others, and nothing more will be said." Sharon's expression turned a little colder. "But if anything should go wrong..."

Rivera nodded. Then he proceeded to turn the whole thing into his idea. "Get to work, Anderson! Let's go get 'em!"

Gideon turned his attention to the job at hand, but he noticed Sharon and Rivera watching each other suspiciously. No love lost there.

He noticed Sharon looking at him sometimes, too. Like she'd seen him in a new light. Maybe she wasn't going to fall in love with him, but at least she knew he could be valuable now. Maybe he knew that, too.

For what felt like the first time a year, Gideon Anderson smiled.

* * *

Back on the _Monterey_, the much-discussed Connor Temple struggled up out of the engine compartment, choking on filthy black smoke. He looked from Danny to Lisa Barrett.

"That's all I can do. Whatever you thought we were going out with, the engine we've got is a relic. It'll run, but I don't know how fast."

Danny hurried back inside and tried to get the engine to turn over, while Lisa crossed the deck and tended to another project.. Connor still could barely breathe, so he leaned over the stern of the boat and gasped for air. Then he remembered Megalodon might surface at any moment, and came closer to hyperventilating.

Abby approached and draped an arm around him. "I'm sorry. So your mum thinks I'm a Spice Girl. It's not your fault. I shouldn't get so angry."

"Well, I shouldn't stare at attractive secret agents, so I guess we're even." Connor frowned. "Or just really bad at this."

Abby hugged him a little tighter. "We have lots of time to get better."

"Yeah," Connor sighed. He wanted to tell her... he didn't know what...

"Guys!" Danny's voice came from the cabin. "Starboard bow!"

Connor squinted into the afternoon sun. There, indeed, the giant fin had resurfaced. It was moving more cautiously this time, but definitely in their direction.

"Lisa!" Danny called, "in your own time..."

Lisa was kneeling beside one group of metal drums; presently she popped back up and rejoined the others. "I've got them lashed together, but so what?"

Danny appeared at the cabin door. "We're gonna beat the bastard at its own game. We ram it. If all the charges go off at once, that should paralyse its nervous system and kill it."

"It will certainly kill _us_," Abby observed.

Danny grinned. "That's what life jackets are for, luv. I don't see another way."

Abby had to admit she didn't, either; oil spills weren't the only thing that could upset an ecosystem. An apex predator like Megalodon, more than a million years from its appointed place in time, could devastate the North American West Coast, including a number of whale species that certainly didn't need extra problems. It just couldn't stay here; and if they couldn't reach the anomaly in time, that left the equation depressingly simple.

She and Connor approached the deck house and watched as Danny finally made the engine grind to life. He turned them slowly onto a collision course with the oncoming fin.

The shark actually dwarfed their boat; Abby had stood before T-Rex and Spinosaurus in her time, but somehow those experiences weren't quite the same. Those predators moved in the same element she did; she had a fighting chance with them. A shark _owned_ the water. Once you were in there with it, you were at its mercy, and it had none. She reached out for Connor's hand and gave it a nervous squeeze; he squeezed back, and they stood there, just waiting.

Lisa was waiting, too. She stood inside the cabin, a little distance from Danny, watching him steer. He was focused on the water, and Abby thought she detected a hint of longing in the American woman's gaze. So, that explained part of the mystery: why Lisa was so invested in Danny. But he didn't seem to feel the same way, or if he did, it didn't seem to be his main consideration. What Abby thought about it like that- what had distracted Danny so thoroughly that he hadn't even noticed Lisa's feelings?- the answer was perfectly obvious. Abby had been there herself.

Then it was too late to worry about Danny, as well. Megalodon was moments away, the water churning around it as it charged forward, unstoppable.

"Everyone head aft," Danny said. "When I give the word, abandon ship."

"What about you?" Lisa said.

Danny laughed but didn't answer, which seemed a very bad sign. The seconds ticked past, and Abby could only stare straight at the oncoming shark...

Apparently everyone else felt the same way, because they all jumped when they heard the amplified voice echo across the water. A female voice, American accent: Sharon Clarke.

"_S.S. Monterey_, veer off! Veer off! We've got your back!"

Abby ran to the gunwale, along with Connor: The_ Pacifica_ was back in range, steaming in from the port, driving straight between them and Megalodon. They'd all been so absorbed with the shark, they hadn't even seen their escort's approach!

Unfortunately, Megalodon didn't take much notice of it, either. Even as Danny wrenched the wheel aside, turning them away from their collision at the last moment, the _Pacifica_ replaced them, with Sharon and Rivera firing EMD harpoons at point-blank range. And the gigantic shark... just didn't care. It smashed through the_ Pacifica_ as it must have the oil tanker, submerged briefly and circled around, while the broken ship took on water.

Rivera and Sharon were thrown from the boat. The major recovered and started swimming toward the _Monterey_, but Sharon hit her head on a chunk of wreckage and floated, dazed and bleeding, as Megalodon returned.

"NO!" someone cried from the remains of the other boat: Gideon Anderson jumped into the water without hesitation, swam out to Sharon, and helped her toward the relative safety of the_ Monterey_.

Connor, Abby, and Lisa struggled to help the pair of them aboard, succeeding around the same time Danny helped Major Rivera into the boat. Unfortunately, the whole fiasco had only delayed the inevitable: Megalodon swallowed the entire aft section of the_ Pacifica_ almost incidentally as it zeroed in on living prey again. Abby heard something_ clink_...

Connor heard it, too. He shared a glance with Abby, and together they turned to Danny:

"Is that boat-" said Abby.

"-outfitted the same as this one?" said Connor.

"Yeah," Danny said, his cocky grin widening until it appeared a lot more genuine. "Yeah, it is."

"The drums!" Lisa said, catching on. "All those EMD weapons..."

Danny turned to one of the new arrivals. "Major, is your sidearm waterproof?"

Rivera frowned at the pistol he wore, shrugged, and handed it to Danny, who took careful aim. Abby recalled he'd been the best shot on the police force, once upon a time. He looked straight into the black eyes of Megalodon, then past them, at that endless maw... then past it, at the half-dozen metal drums about to disappear down its gullet.

"Saw this in a film once," Danny said.

Connor grinned. "The line you're looking for is, 'Smile, you son of a-'"

Danny fired, striking one of the EMD grenades. All the rest of the drums Megalodon had just swallowed went up in a chain reaction, with a deafening shriek and an electric burst that caused Abby's hair to stand on end from where she was standing. She and Connor ducked away from the blast-

When they looked again, there was nothing to see but the slightly charred remains of a twenty-plus-metre shark sinking down into the depths. A long moment passed, with no one quite sure what had just happened. Somebody started laughing from relief and exhaustion.

Abby hugged Connor. Lisa hugged Danny. Danny hugged Abby and Connor hugged Lisa; then they switched. Sharon Clarke recovered enough to smile at Gideon and draw him into an embarrassed hug. And Major Rivera...

Rivera stood a little distance away, watching the shark disappear, not quite frowning.

* * *

The time back in London was quite late when Becker finally got himself patched up and drove to Jess's flat. He didn't know how long he stood there, knocking on the door, but he was beginning to fear the neighbours would take notice.

Jess was half-asleep when she appeared at the door, dressed in a robe and bleary-eyed. She stared at Becker as though she thought he might be a dream, stifled a yawn, and peered at him again.

"Becker, it's past midnight. What-"

"I haven't been honest with you," he said. "May I come in?"

Jess frowned. "With an introduction like that, how can I refuse?"

Becker stepped inside and glanced around while Jess closed the door. The apartment was... extremely Jess, and when it came to home decoration, he wasn't certain that was a compliment. Between the pastel colours and the frills and lace...

"It's, erm... nice," he said.

"If you'd come up months ago, you'd know that," Jess said. From her tone, she was down to the last of her patience. "Look, it really is late. If you've come to apologise, then consider today forgotten. You know I'll forgive you. I always have. If you want something else, like my permission to break things off, well...that might take a bit longer, but I'll forgive that, too. I just need time."

"Is that how I've made you feel?" Becker said. "Like I'm looking for an excuse to end this? I'm sorry."

"That's a start."

He took a deep breath. "The fact is, I've spoken to Matt... the other Matt. He told me something..."

Over the next few minutes, he explained to Jess everything that had happened: The future double's warnings that harm would come to Jess if she remained in the ARC and his conviction that only Becker could protect her, by driving her away. He explained he was only trying to slow things down, to keep the future Matt predicted at bay. He explained that this was so difficult precisely because he did care about her so much. He'd seen it vividly demonstrated what happened to people at the ARC who forgot how dangerous their world was. He didn't let himself get close because he feared losing Jess more than all of them put together. He just wanted to keep her safe.

When he was done, he fell silent, and the moment stretched out. He felt better; he really did. Now that his feelings for Jess were out in the open, Becker was certain she would understand his impossible situation, and be patient until the other Matt's future could be sorted out. Indeed, she stared at him with new understanding, eyes shining with tears that must have been from joy.

And then she slapped him.

"You_ idiot_!" Jess hissed. "How could you?"

"Look, I was only-"

"How could you put some phantom ahead of us? For the last time: I'm not Sarah Page! I'm not waiting to die when it'll hurt you the most!"

Becker sighed. "I only thought, if we held off for a couple of months-"

"That's not your decision alone! Even if it were, how could you think I'd leave my friends? My work? The ARC means as much to me as it does to you!"

"I know that," Becker said, "but-"

"And one more thing we should be clear about: It's far too late. I already love you. I have since the day we met, and that is _my_ decision. All you get to decide is what you want to do about it."

Her anger spent, Jess fell silent, took a deep breath, and sat back, glaring at him. Becker tried to summon some argument, some excuse. Some reason to do the smart thing and walk away. But all he could think was how beautiful she looked, and how much time he'd wasted trying to think of the right thing to say, the right way to react.

Then the meaning of her words struck home, and he realised what he wanted to do about it. So he pulled her close and kissed her, and Jess kissed him back.

By the time the conversation moved into the bedroom, Becker thought he probably did owe Chris Newman a grudging apology. He didn't know whether the mercenary had been smart or lucky, compassionate or sarcastic, in urging him toward this conversation. In the final analysis, it didn't matter in the slightest...

* * *

The sun was setting over the Pacific as Danny Quinn brought the _Monterey_ back into port. They'd left the open ocean behind, and were sailing through a little bay en route to the pier, the sky shining down orange, yellow, and red on impossibly blue water. He took a deep breath and exhaled. A lot of things about his new life were less than ideal. But he did think he could get used to the scenery.

He heard a knock on the cabin door, and turned to see Abby Maitland. She stepped inside and watched the sunset with Danny in companionable silence.

He knew what Abby wanted to know. He should have realised she wouldn't be satisfied with the simple version. Abby never did anything the easy way; it was the main thing she had in common with her husband.

"Hi there," Danny said, a beat too late.

"Hi."

He affected a light tone. "So that was fun, wasn't it? Blast from the past? Sorry we had to kill the shark, though."

"Forget it," Abby said, "no choice. I just hope nothing else got through the anomaly. In an area the size of the Pacific... well, you never know. Could be more of them out there, somewhere."

"It's locked now," Danny said, remembering the anticlimactic trip back, homing in on the anomaly and dropping one of their remaining depth charges into it. "I don't want you to worry about the oil spill. Lisa has connections; it will be cleaned up properly, I promise."

"I believe you," Abby said.

He laughed. "You know, you could do this for a living. Wouldn't like a job, would you?"

"Can't seem to get rid of the one I've got," Abby sighed. "Danny, why are you here? Where's your brother, really?"

And there it was. When he thought about it, Danny knew he wanted to answer the question as much as Abby wanted to ask it. It might have been the reason he'd been so keen to bring his old friends to Area 94 in the first place.

"He's, eh..." Danny cleared his throat. "He's in a place where no one will find him. He got here a few days before I did and killed my predecessor. Nearly killed Lisa, too. I saved her life, and we caught him together.

"The American government pronounced him a terrorist, a terrorist of... time, I guess, which may be more true than I'd like to admit. They've got these military tribunals...

"He was facing execution, but Lisa made a deal. They commuted his sentence down to ten years in prison. Ten years I'll spend working for them."

"Danny, I'm so sorry." Abby hesitated. "Look, I know you love your brother. No one understands like me, yeah? But Patrick has hurt a lot of people. Are you sure he's...?"

"Worth it?" Danny said. "He's my brother."

Abby nodded, accepting that. They watched the sunset in silence. Then she stirred. "Do you trust them?"

"I trust Lisa," he said. "She's a good person. She promised she'd get help for Patrick when he gets out, and I believe her. As for the rest... I can handle myself."

"I hope you're right," Abby said.

"It'd be easier with help. I was serious about that job. Any time you want to get away."

By the look on her face, Abby was tempted- not so much by the job as by the thought of running away. She and Connor both had a fugitive look about them, ever since their arrival. Danny hadn't thought it was his business, but as their cards were on the table, he was about to ask. Then there was another knock. Connor poked his head in, and Danny motioned him inside.

"Room in here? That American major keeps glowering at me."

Danny grunted. "You get used to him. How's Sharon?"

Connor stepped to the fore of the cabin and saw the sunset. He smiled at Abby and put an arm around her before answering. "She'll be all right. Gideon's being very attentive."

"I'll bet he is," Abby said, her tone dripping sarcasm at the foolishness of men.

"Oh, Abby: Lisa wanted to know if you could recommend an expert on sea birds. To help with the environmental impact of the spill, you know. Sounded urgent."

As Danny had observed, Connor wasn't very subtle. For one thing, they still didn't have any mobile reception, so nothing Lisa had to do about the spill couldn't wait until they docked. Abby clearly knew something was up, but after the day they'd had, she seemed more amused than anything else.

"I'll get right on that, then."

With a gentle touch and a sympathetic smile for Danny, she was gone, leaving him alone with Connor.

"All right. Why'd you send your wife out of the room?"

Danny expected- he didn't know what. Something to do with their honeymoon, probably. Connor taking him up on his promise of VIP treatment to arrange some sort of surprise. He did not expect the extremely serious, almost grim look that came over his old friend's face.

"We have to talk," Connor said. "Remember you offered to make this worth our while? Well, there's just one thing I want. I need you to sack Gideon. Send him away- to Ireland, if you can manage it, but mostly just... some place safe, away from this life for good. I'll get you a replacement. But he can't be here any longer, and you can't ask me why."

Danny turned over that rather odd request in his mind. It wasn't such a big thing to ask- the Director had the final say over personnel, but he rarely contradicted Danny or Lisa on the people they'd brought in. And Gideon, while extremely clever, wasn't indispensable. It seemed a shame, though...

"You're turning down Star Wars for _that_?" he said at length. "He's just starting to fit in. Geeks saving beautiful women... that's how legends are born."

"Yeah, but not all legends are the same. Some of us are expendable, and some of us are named _Anderson_. He's got to survive, no matter what."

"Survive?" Danny laughed. "What are you talking about?"

"Nothing. Just..." Connor sighed. "There's something coming, Danny."

Danny turned from the wheel. In the fading light, he saw something in Connor's eyes he'd never seen before. Something like anger... and despair.

"Look, what is this? What's going on? Come on, let me help. Just like the old days."

"Those days are gone." Connor shook his head and clasped him on the shoulder. "You've been a really good friend, Danny. Thanks."

With those words- which sounded uncomfortably like a farewell- hanging in the air, Connor turned and left the cabin. Danny watched until he'd gone, wondering what the hell just happened.

* * *

After a long day at the ARC, Chris Newman stopped off at a pub, and didn't return to his Spartan motel room until closing time. He hadn't had more than a couple of drinks; he never did. He just needed to feel normal, to be around people who didn't know about his past and didn't have any idea about the remarkable things happening around them. He never quite felt he belonged, even then, but it was nice to see that people_ could_ belong... somewhere.

On this night, he'd seen enough to temporarily put Anderson and Becker and timelines and dinosaurs out of his mind. He was feeling nearly optimistic, by his standards, when he turned his key in the lock and prepared to collapse into bed. And then his mobile chimed.

Newman glared at the number it displayed; he'd known this call might come, but he'd begun to hope...

There was nothing for it, so he answered. "Newman."

"Mr. Newman," said a gravelly American voice, "it's time."

Newman shut his eyes to ward off the headache. The hell of it was, he'd been telling the truth. Everything he'd said to Matt Anderson and the others- about liking Abby and Emily, about cutting his ties with the people behind Southfield- all that was precisely true. He'd just left out the part where they didn't take 'no' for an answer.

Despite his anger, he kept his tone light, with the familiar sarcastic edge. "What, no luck killing the Temples? Sad for you. I warned you they were good."

"Never mind that," the American said. "The timetable's been accelerated. You'll bring her to us."

"What, now?" Newman said. Then he remembered what happened to people who defied them- or rather, what never happened at all. Whole lifetimes reduced to nothing, lost even to memory. He'd seen it happen. So he said the professional thing. "Yeah, understood."

He was about to turn off the mobile- the American Director of Area 94 never wasted unnecessary words on the help- but then he heard the voice again.

"Oh, Newman? One more thing. We've got a security breach. Someone _hacked_ us."

"Hacked _you_?" Newman said, as his gut turned to ice. "Who could manage that?"

"You know the answer. It was your little work buddy, Jess Parker. She knows all about you."

"Does she?" Newman murmured.

"Yes. Unfortunate. Make sure she's dead before you leave."

Newman took the mobile away from his ear, stared at it, rallied: "I don't want to do that, sir."

"Then perhaps you'd prefer to go back where you came from. I can arrange that very easily."

"...no," Newman said, at length. "No, of course not."

"Then you know what you have to do. Bring us Jennifer Lewis. Kill the girl. Do it quickly; delays will be costly."

"Understood," said Newman.

The line went dead, and he threw it across the room. Whatever the director said, he had no intention of doing the job immediately. He had to think first, had to consider his options. He'd killed a lot of people in his time, but few of them had been innocent. None of them had been like Jess. And no one in the world was like Jennifer Lewis. She was unique. Newman didn't intend to destroy something like that without thinking it through first.

The trouble was, he'd already had plenty of time to think through this particular problem, and he always came back to the same place: It was their deaths, or his own. In such instances, Newman made it a professional policy to always choose_ them._

He was a businessman, after all. He'd been going soft at the ARC. Perhaps it was time for that to end... and everything else with it.

* * *

For Connor Temple, the day ended as it began: Him in his robe, looking out over the Pacific Ocean. He was on the balcony this time, enjoying the first cool breezes of night. It would have been a lovely way to spend a holiday, if not for the part where he kept trying to explain the inexplicable.

"...you see, that's why I must have sent you to the Pleistocene," he said into his microphone. "I understand now. I had to focus the- no, forget it, that's too complicated. Delete."

It was the seventh version of the message he'd recorded to his laptop; Connor didn't know why he was in such a rush. He'd already finished the part of his work that was time-sensitive. The message would be stored on the ARC's computer, and could be adjusted at any time... up until the end. But Connor preferred to do it now, to have it over with, so he could enjoy his last few days with Abby in peace.

Speaking of Abby, he heard her voice from inside the suite: "Connor? Are you coming to bed?"

"Yup, one minute!" He took a deep breath and started the recording again. "I guess you don't care about the technical details. The thing to know is, I did it because I love you. And I understand why you've been so nice to me. You've spoken to Matt. You know that I die soon.

"What I guess you don't know is, I've spoken to him, too. And I'm all right with it- really. I got to marry you. I'm the luckiest bloke in the world."

It still wasn't right, but it could wait. Something stirred behind him; not quite the breeze. Connor turned to see the future version of Matt, the last of the golden light that marked his time travels fading away.

"Connor," he said, "it's time."

"Yeah." Closing his laptop, he stood and produced a trio of small devices from the pockets of his robe: The fail-safe devices he'd built back at the ARC, before travelling to the past, just in case. He hadn't planned on using them so soon. But when Matt explained what had to happen, everything became clear.

He handed the devices over. "The first one will sabotage the time machine, completing the loop that sent us back to the past. Just download those files any time I'm not watching. "

"What about the others?"

"This one's yours and that one's Abby's. Don't get them mixed up; they have different settings. If you use the wrong one, you'll paradox. You could wipe out history."

"I understand." Future-Matt placed a hand on Connor's shoulder, met his eyes with obvious difficulty. "I'm so sorry, Connor. I wish there was another way."

"Don't. It's just... history. It's already happened."

Future-Matt nodded. "If we do it this way, she lives. She's happy. I've seen it."

"Yeah," said Connor, grateful for that. His mind drifted back to all they'd been through. "You know, Cutter was brave at the end. I don't feel very brave."

"You're the bravest man I know."

Another soft glow, nearly indistinguishable from the stars peeking through the deep blue sky, and Matt's double was gone, leaving Connor to face the future alone.

**THE END**

_...of this story. Two more stories remain in the sixth series. Next, a vicious raptor attack leaves a member of the team near death and the rest hunting down a traitor, in..._

**Primeval 6.6: Shadow of a Man**

_Coming soon!_


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